obile Usage Statistics Every Marketer Must Know by 2023 [Infographic]

Ecommerce store owners cannot afford to ignore the importance of a mobile-optimized online shop to increase sales and customers. Mobile commerce sales are expected to reach $3.56 trillion by 2021.

Understanding how mobile consumers use their devices is key to this. Before you start making changes to your store, make sure you read the following for the most current facts and figures that will help you plan your strategy.

This article will provide important statistics about mobile usage, including the number of smartphone owners and digital advertising spend on smartphones.

Let’s get to it, if you’re ready!

1. How many people own smartphones?

One thing that we cannot overlook when discussing mobile usage statistics is the dominance by smartphones.

According to Statista, there are 6.8 billion smartphone owners worldwide. With 8 billion people worldwide, this translates to a smartphone penetration rate of more than 80 percent.

Smartphone users are also increasing rapidly, as evidenced by the fact there were 3.7 million smartphone users in 2016. The number of smartphone users has risen by 86.5 percent in seven years.

Smartphone usage is expected increase over the next few years. It will surpass seven billion in 2024, before increasing further to 7.5 million in 2026.

China is the most populous nation in the world and home to the largest number of smartphone users. India is second with 650 million users, while China has more than 910 million. With 249 million smartphone users, the United States is the country with the highest number.

2. Mobile Devices: Time Wasters

Now you have an idea about how many people own smartphones. The next thing to find out is how much time they are used.

The average American adult spent 3 hours and 43 mins per day using mobile devices in 2019. This was the first time mobile usage exceeded television viewing time, at 3 hours 35 minutes.

This gap widened over the years. In 2021, mobile device time was just under 4 hours (54 minutes and 3 hours respectively), compared to TV time of 3 hours 22 minutes.

We can zoom in on this statistic a bit on smartphones and we see that US adults use their smartphones on average for 2 hours 55 minutes per day in 2019, nine minutes more than in the previous year (eMarketer 2019).

3. People use phones for product research

The next mobile statistic will reveal how mobile devices impact consumers’ product research. Information has become more accessible online, and consumers are adapting to this.

According to the latest statistics, almost seven out of ten US internet users say that they would read customer reviews while in-store prior to approaching employees (eMarketer 2019, 2019).

Mobile users are not only doing product reviews in-store, but they’re also looking for similar products. 55% of them also look for similar products to those they are considering purchasing. 55 percent search for product specifications.

These statistics on mobile usage highlight the importance to provide consumers with a positive experience.

4. Mobile Shopping

People are not only using mobile devices for product research but they are also using them to make purchases.

Recent mobile statistics suggest a high dependence on online shopping via mobile devices. Globally, more than half (50.9%) of online shoppers use their phones at least once per week to buy products (DataReportal 2023).

Females between the ages of 35 and 44 are the most active internet users, with 56.8% saying that they have purchased a product online using their mobile phones in the last week. The same goes for males, with 52.4 percent of them engaging in mobile commerce. Comparatively, only 46.6 percent male internet users aged 16-24 do this.

Mobile shopping is a huge trend and you need to make sure your mobile optimization strategy is top-of-mind for your ecommerce business. This is because mobile customers who have had a bad experience with a business’s website will be less likely to purchase from them again.

5. Mobile Shopping: The Alternative

Many shoppers find the absence of mobile shopping a major dealbreaker, given the convenience and ease of online shopping.

If you are still skeptical about the benefits of setting your ecommerce store up for mobile commerce, here is another statistic: Nearly six in ten shoppers believe that being able purchase products from mobile devices is a key reason they choose brands or retailers to shop from (Google, 2019).

When you are working on your online store, be sure to focus on mobile shopping. You must ensure that your customers have a seamless mobile shopping experience.

This includes optimizing all aspects of your store (i.e. images, layout, call-to-action buttons, etc.) Optimized mobile experience, ensuring fast load times and multiple payment options.

6. Mobile Device Statistics: Traffic

Another statistic that highlights the popularity of mobile usage is the rising share of website traffic coming from mobile devices.

In 2015, mobile traffic accounted for less than a third (31.16%) of global web traffic. Six years later, at the beginning of 2021, that number has risen to 54.8 percent. This is a leap of 75.9% (Statista).

Mobile traffic accounts for over half of all website traffic worldwide since the third quarter 2019.

We can expect more mobile traffic with the advent of 5G technology. This will allow for faster internet speeds and connections. Experts predict that the average smartphone data usage will increase from 10GB at the end 2020 to 35GB in 2026.

7. Mobile time spent with digital media

We have seen that many consumers spend a large portion of their internet time on mobile devices, as shown by the above statistics. We’ll show you how they consume digital media through these statistics.

According to Comscore 2019, smartphones account for 70% of all digital media time in the US. This is 22.8 percent more than the 2017 57 percent.

We see a sharp difference in the time that is spent on digital media via smartphones. The former is unchanged at 7 percent, but US consumers now spend 63 percent of their time using apps on smartphones to access digital media. This is up from 50 percent in 2017.

These mobile statistics show that smartphones are the most used devices for internet users to consume digital media. Only 23 percent of US consumers spend their time with digital media on the desktop. Tablets make up seven percent.

8. Digital Ad Spending on Mobile

Advertisers are spending more money to reach consumers because of the increased use of mobile devices. In fact, digital ads have outperformed traditional ads in terms of spending for the first time ever in 2019.

The latest statistics on mobile marketing show that digital ad spending on mobile amounted only to $129.8 in 2021. This is greater than two-thirds (67.9%) of total digital ad expenditure that year (eMarketer 2021).

This represents an annual increase in 26.5 percent with the highest growth coming from entertainment. Businesses in the entertainment sector increased their mobile ad spending by 37.5% in 2021. Despite this increase in spending, the mobile ad expenditure of the entertainment industry is still at $8.54 trillion.

Retail and CPG (Consumer Packaged Goods) are the two industries that spend the most on digital advertising for mobile. They have respective expenditures of $30.91 and $21.83 billion.

9. Mobile Retail Conversion Rate

Despite mobile shopping being so popular, the conversion rate mobile devices to ecommerce continues to be lower than desktops.

The global retail conversion rate of mobile phones to smartphones is 1.82 percent according to Smartinsights 2019, the most recent mobile statistics. This is significantly higher than the 3.49 percent conversion rate for tablets but still lower than desktops’ 3.90 percent.

Similar distributions are seen in the US with mobile phone and tablet conversion rates at 1.53 percent, 3.36 percent, respectively. Desktop conversion rates stand at 4.14 percent.

This shows that, while mobile users enjoy browsing and product research via their smartphones, desktops remain the preferred method for making transactions.

These benchmark figures will help you assess how your store is performing. Conversion Rate

10. Voice Search on Mobile

Voice search is an important aspect of optimizing your mobile ecommerce store .

Apart from the fact that more than 25% of online users already use voice search, it seems like its popularity is increasing. According to Quoracreative 2019, 60 percent of smartphone owners claim that they have used voice search at least once within the last 12 months.

Although voice search is more popular with teenagers, over half use it every day. However, around nine percent of people between 55-64 also use voice search.

Optimizing your dropshipping shop for mobile is only half the battle. Voice search queries are also important. This means that you should keep your copy concise and target question keywords like who, what and where.

Conclusion

You now have a better understanding of the trends in mobile shopping and digital advertising spend. This will allow you to see how consumers interact with mobile devices and predict the future.

These statistics on mobile usage can help you create a mobile-first strategy to propel your dropshipping company forward. This will result in higher engagement, traffic span styling=”font-weight 400 ;”>,, and ultimately sales. These statistics can help you give your business an edge.

Summary: Mobile Usage Statistics

Here is a summary of all the Mobile Usage statistics that you should know by 2023:

1. In 2023, there will be 6.8 billion smartphone owners worldwide.
2. 
   Americans spend on average 2 hours and 55 minutes per day on their smartphones.
   
3. 
   69 per cent of internet users prefer to search for reviews on their smartphones rather than meet with an employee in-store.
   
4. Worldwide, 50.9 percent of online shoppers shop at least once per week on their mobile phones.
5. 
   Six in ten consumers say that the ability to shop on mobile is a key factor in brand selection.
   
6. 
   Mobile web traffic makes up 54.8 percent global web traffic.
   
7. 
   70% of all digital media time in the US goes to smartphones.
   
8. Mobile ads accounted for more than two-thirds in digital advertising spend in the United States by 2021.
9. 
   The global mobile retail conversion rate for mobile phones is 1.82 percent compared to 3.9% for desktops.
   
10. 
    Six of ten smartphone owners have used voice search at least once within the last year.
    

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Are there any other statistics you would like to see about mobile usage? Please leave your comments below!

Author: Ying Lin