11 mobile stats you absolutely have to read right now

Unless you’ve just woken up from an extraordinarily long coma (in which case, there’s so much we have to tell you), you’re probably well aware of the massive impact mobile technology has had on the world. You just have to look around you, or reach into your pocket and compare the astounding technology in your smartphone to what was inside the brick-sized devices we were all carrying around less than 20 years ago.

Quite aside from the technological shifts, mobile has also pretty much become ubiquitous. According to Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers (KPCB)’s Mary Meeker, there are around 5.2-billion-mobile users. Of those, only around 30% currently have smartphones, representing a massive growth opportunity.

Knowing that the opportunity is there is not, however, enough. You need to know what kinds of opportunity there is. A decent place to start could be the below 11 stats on the state of mobile, MEF — a global community for mobile content and commerce.

1. Ninety percent of all data has been created in the last two years. This, it seems, is largely down to the proliferation of smartphones. Business Insider estimates that by 2017 mobile users will be producing 10 000 000 terabytes of data per month.

2. Twenty percent of apps are only used once and if an app is only opened once in seven days, there is a 60% chance that it will never be opened again.

3. Juniper Research says that by 2016, 3-million patients worldwide will be using remote healthcare monitoring devices that use a smartphone as a hub to transmit information.

4. Meanwhile health and fitness apps usage has also grown exponentially since 2013. Flurry Analytics reports a 62% increase in their use over the past 6 months

5. Mobile money users are 26% more likely to purchase via mobile. Globally, MEF reports that 91% of people who actively bank or make payment via mobile made some form of mobile purchase as opposed to 65% of all mobile media users.

Oh, and last year the largest mobile money sum via the PayPal app was US$48 000… for a bulldozer.

6. The biggest single barrier to purchasing via the mobile device is trust with 40% of respondents in a recent MEF survey citing it as their main concern.

7. According to the Magazine Publishers Association (MPA)’s latest research, 10% of tablet owners in the US now read digital magazines almost every day, rising to 13 per cent at least once a week, 17 per cent 1-3 times per month and 40% once per month.

8. Mobile services such as messaging apps (including social media updates and photo sharing) are the most popular in terms of growth with Flurry Analytics recording a 203% growth in this category in 2013.

9. According to MEF, 17% of mobile users have downloaded an education app. Growth markets are driving this change with four of the top five countries from growth markets, providing opportunity where it is needed most.

10. There are more than one-billion monthly active users of Facebook mobile – that’s a staggering 79 per cent of its total users worldwide.

11. Heavy spenders on mobile (those prepared to purchase big ticket items at $150+) tend to come from growth markets reflecting the mobile first nature of internet access in these regions. Globally, reports MEF, Mexico (61%) Nigeria (61%) and Kenya (67%) have the highest proportion of heavy spenders and it is these markets, particularly African nations that are driving the adoption of mobile money.