Apps now take up half of all digital time spent

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US consumers are now mobile-first when accessing the internet; in July, smartphone apps accounted for 50% of digital media time spent for US internet users, according to new comScore data.

That’s up from 46% in July 2015, 41% in 2014, and 34% in 2013. Considering the upward trend, apps will likely continue to command a greater share of smartphone users’ time spent on their devices.

The data reinforces the importance of apps for brands and businesses. As users become increasingly reliant on their apps to access information, or just to kill time, it’s more important than ever that businesses establish a presence where users' time is spent. However, it’s worth noting that much of this time is spent within just a handful of apps.

There are a number of developments that have led to the increase in app usage:

The US smartphone market is saturated. Around 70% of the US population owns a smartphone. Moreover, many users are constantly within reach of their device. For some, checking their smartphone is the first thing they do in the morning and the last thing they do at night, according to a BI Intelligence survey.
Consumers are gaining access to faster networks. The proliferation of 4G LTE networks means that users have greater access to fast network speeds. This makes it possible for consumers to complete many of the actions they would have needed a desktop for in the past, such as online shopping, watching movies, etc.
Larger screens are now more common. Larger smartphone screens are now commonplace and provide users with a much better interface than older smartphone models. Larger screens make it easier for users to interact with their devices and reduce the need to utilize a desktop to complete a task.

Google is clearly taking notice of the trend: The company derives a significant proportion of its ad revenue from the mobile web. Because of this, any time spent outside of the mobile web, or on one of the company’s apps, is a lost revenue opportunity.

The search giant has been integrating much of the functionality of apps, such as faster loading times, into the mobile web with its Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP). Google is also indexing much of the data collected from apps to enable users to search for apps and app data via its Search app.

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