An Inside Look: Habits of Smartphone Users in India

According to recent statistics, the world currently has around 2.7 billion smartphone users, with roughly one-third of the global population having access to a mobile. Of this figure, 340 million hail from India, making the country an industry leader and a technological powerhouse second only to China.

This means that around 28 percent of India’s population owns or uses a smartphone, and they have now become an integral part of our everyday lives for many of us. Smartphones can assist us with a large array of tasks, from staying connected via messaging and social media through to tracking our step count or ordering lunch.

Considering the roles our phones can fulfill, have you ever stopped to wonder how most of the time on our mobiles is spent? If the answer is ‘yes’, then you’ll almost certainly be interested in reading this article. We analyzed the research and came up with some interesting answers.

Gaming and entertainment

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Source: Pixabay

According to a study carried out in 2019, around 42 percent of people regularly use their phones for gaming and entertainment. This umbrella grouping contains lots of different and more specific categories, with iGaming, or online casinos, being particularly popular.

iGaming is a specific form of online gambling, which is widely played in India. Users can access sites like Genesis Casino on your mobile to indulge in activities including poker, live casino, slot games, and more. Other popular forms of entertainment include the many games that can be downloaded onto phones via various app stores, watching TV and movies through streaming platforms like Amazon Prime, and listening to music on sites like Spotify.

Staying connected

As well as using our phones to stay entertained, the vast majority of people unsurprisingly state that they use their devices to keep in touch with friends and family members. Indeed, a study of this from 2019 showed that 74 percent of mobile users send or receive messages every day, and 55 percent multiple times a day.

This means that a large proportion of the time we spend on our smartphones is devoted to doing exactly what they were designed for; helping us to stay connected. This is important in terms of safety as much as being connected socially. For example, there is an app called My Safetipin which is designed to make navigation safer when you’re in a new area.

Social media

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Source: Pixabay

In addition, 62 percent of people say they regularly use their phones to access Facebook and other social media platforms. This is unsurprising given that the site has 2.7 billion active users, with 83 percent of women and 75 percent of men across the globe having profiles.

Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and so on also take up a lot of the time spent on our smartphones, offering us even more ways to stay connected.

Online shopping

As well as utilizing our phones to keep in touch, there’s another practical task that we often carry out via the medium of our mobiles: online shopping. 56 percent of us use our phones for this purpose.

Indeed, it is estimated that, as of 2020, 70.7 percent of internet users in India are also online buyers, a figure which equates to over 329 million people. These purchases, many of them made from mobiles, pump roughly $33 billion into the country’s economy each year.

When it comes to assessing the mobile habits of people in India, it’s fair to say that smartphones have managed to inveigle themselves into every area of our lives. From providing us with ways to stay entertained, to helping us keep in touch with friends and family, they undoubtedly enrich our days and make them not only easier but more enjoyable too.

What would you say you spend the most time doing on your smartphone?