Generation Y chooses mobile web - report

29 Nov 2010

OSLO: According to the Opera State of the Mobile Web report released on Wednesday, 24 November 2010, most 18-27 year-old Opera Mini users use their mobile phones to browse the web more often than they use a desktop or laptop computer for the same purpose.

Generation Y chooses mobile web - report

In Nigeria, South Africa, and Indonesia, over 90% of Generation Y users said they use their mobile phones more than desktop or laptop computers to access the internet.

The countries, namely Poland, Germany, US, and Brazil, with the highest percentage of respondents using desktop or laptop computers as the primary means of internet access were countries where smartphones are among the top handsets used. In Nigeria, South Africa, and Indonesia, however, more than 9 out of 10 respondents said they browse the web on their handsets more than they browse on a laptop or desktop computer.

Looking at the top handsets used by Opera Mini users in those countries, we notice fewer smartphones (compared to Poland, Germany, United States, and Brazil). This result presents a challenge to the long-standing belief that smartphone uptake will be the major driver of mobile web usage globally.

The mobile web and Generation Y

The report highlights the previously unpublished data surrounding mobile and internet lifestyle choices and attitudes among Opera Mini users in various countries around the world. Specifically, it focuses on results from users in the United States, China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Russia, South Africa, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, Vietnam, Brazil, Germany, and Poland. These countries represent major and/or emerging markets in terms of Opera Mini usage.

Highlights from the report

Almost 90% of respondents in the US aged 18-27 have used their phones to share pictures. Of the profiled countries, Vietnam, at 67%, had the lowest use of mobile phones to share pictures.
Respondents in the US are least likely to have asked someone out on a date via SMS (44%). Respondents in China (84%), Germany (84%) and Vietnam (83%) are most likely to have used SMS texts to ask someone out on a date.
Generation Y, in both China and the US, share a disdain for printed newspapers. 53% of respondents in the US and 57% of respondents in China rarely or never read physical newspapers.
Respondents in South Africa (49%) and the US (44%) were somewhat to very uncomfortable sharing their personal information online.

Global trends

In October 2010, Opera Mini had over 76.3 million users, a 7.1% increase from September 2010 and more than 92% compared to October 2009.
Opera Mini users viewed over 41.6 billion pages in October 2010. Since September, page views have gone up 12.6%. Since October 2009, page views have increased 142%.
In October 2010, Opera Mini users generated over 616 million MB of data for operators worldwide. Since September, the data consumed went up by 15.1%. Data in Opera Mini is compressed up to 90%. If this data were uncompressed, Opera Mini users would have viewed over 5.7 petabytes of data in October. Since October 2009, data traffic is up 134%.
Kazakhstan, Belarus, Egypt, the Philippines and Bangladesh all went up in the top 20 countries ranking, while Kenya, Poland and Germany went down in the rankings.

Russia and CIS trends

Part three of this months report looks at countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The top 11 countries using Opera Mini in that region are Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan.
From October 2009 to October 2010, pageviews in the top 11 countries of the CIS increased by 128%, unique users increased by 44% and data transferred increased by 119%.
Growth rates in the CIS: Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan lead the top 11 countries of the region in terms of page-view growth (2124.9% and 600.1%, respectively). Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan lead the top 11 countries of the region in growth of unique users (517.2% and 211.0%, respectively). Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan lead the top 11 countries of the region in growth of data transferred (1764.8% and 315.2%, respectively). Armenia leads the top 11 countries of the region in pageviews per user, with each user browsing 1,380 pages on average each month.
Among the countries of the CIS, the most popular sites include Vkontakte, Yandex, Odnoklassniki.ru, Google, and Mail.ru.
The report looks at the top 10 handsets used in each of the top 11 CIS countries. Out of the 110 total handsets listed, 100 of them were Nokia, five of them were Sony Ericsson, second of them were Samsung, two of them were LG, and one was Apple.

"We have often said that the next generation will grow up knowing the web mostly through their mobile phones," said Jon von Tetzchner, co-founder, Opera. "We see this trend already emerging in different regions around the world. The mobile web will bring a profound change in how we connect with one another. I think the results from this survey already show that change taking place."

The full report is available at www.opera.com/smw/ (English only).