Undoubtedly, smartphones have changed the world. Not only are they prevalent in the countries you’d expect, but they are also expanding rapidly in the developing world and especially in China. “The rate of iOS and Android device adoption has surpassed that of any consumer technology in history. Compared to recent technologies, smart device adoption is being adopted 10X faster than that of the 80s PC revolution, 2X faster than that of 90s Internet Boom and 3X faster than that of recent social network adoption,” writes Peter Farago for Flurry. For July of this year, Flurry estimates 640 million iOS and Android devices were in use worldwide, and only 165 million were from the United States. China, on the other hand, is in second place with 128 million. The report predicts that China could overtake the US as soon as the end of this year.
Perhaps the most interesting bit of data in this report is that since July 2011, China’s use of iOS and Android devices has grown 401 percent. Chile, Brazil, and Argentina have all grown over 200 percent in the same time period. In July 2011, 52 percent of tracked application use was from the United States. In 2012, that dropped to 36 percent as smartphone use has exploded in the rest of the world.
The last bit of neat information involves the percentage of 15-64 years olds in each country that have smartphones. Singapore and Hong Kong top the list with 92 percent and 87 percent respectively, but the United States comes in a very respectable 5th place with 78 percent right behind Australia at number four and Sweden at number three. This report is full of fascinating data, and it is worth your time to read the whole thing.
Source: Flurry
