Right after the mobile world congress this year, I posted that this was definitely the Year of the Browser. Opera have just released some pretty interesting stats on mobile web usage for Q1 2008 through the Opera mini browser:
Social networking stands supreme
Almost 40% of traffic worldwide is to social networks. In some countries, such as the United States, South Africa and Indonesia, the social Web accounts for more than 60% of the traffic.
One Web will triumph over WAP content
Full Web surfing comprises more than 77% of all traffic. Content on WAP and .mobi sites accounted for 23% of mobile Web traffic. This share continues to decline as more consumers both use Opera Mini to access rich Web content and become more comfortable browsing the Web on their phones.
Data Consumed
As the content available to mobile phones improves, data consumption increases. Last month, those 11.9 million Opera Mini users generated more than 33 million MB of data for operators worldwide. This represents an almost 88% growth over the previous quarter.
88% Growth, and they’re just talking about OPERA. Nevermind the iPhone, Series 60 phones or Blackberries…I’ve recently realized that I’m clocking in at circa 100MB of data monthly through my iPhone these days.
The mobile web is definitely gaining momentum. Start your engines.
Jason Ball 