Smartphone owners use an average of 27 apps per month
During WWDC a few weeks ago, Apple, as it's prone to do, provided us with some updates regarding the ever increasing popularity of the App Store. As of early June, Tim Cook noted that iOS users have cumulatively downloaded 75 billion apps from an App Store that currently boasts upwards of 1.2 million apps.
Those numbers are impressive, but on an individual basis, one has to wonder just how many apps the average user tends to use.
To answer that question, in comes Nielsen with a report detailing how many apps people tend to use on a monthly basis.
According to Nielsen, U.S. iPhone and Android users over 18 have been increasing the time they spend using mobile applications, which is up 65 percent over just two years ago. In the last quarter of 2013, for example, users spent 30 hours, 15 minutes using apps per month. That's a full half-day more than the 18 hours, 18 minutes they spent per month in Q4 2011, the new report notes.
What's interesting is how little the number of apps used per month has changed over this same period of time, however. In Q4 2011, the average number of apps used per month was 23.2. The following year (Q4 2012) it grew to 26.5, and as of Q4 2013 it was just 26.8.
Interestingly enough, I did a quick survey of how many apps I've used over the last month and the number, surprise surprise, was 27.
