How Habit Drives Mobile App Usage

How Habit Drives Mobile App Usage by Market Action Research
(Last Modified: 2021-03-23T00:14:21.322069+00:00)

Andrew Lipsman recently wrote an article describing “How the Power of Habit Drives Mobile App Usage,” based on the “U.S. Mobile App Report” released in September by comScore. There is no doubt that people are using mobile devices, predominantly smartphones, more than ever. An influx of new findings investigating how individuals use apps is the result. What seems to be a common theme is how habitual the usage is for American consumers. While it may be surprising that Americans spent 68 hours per user in June 2015, Millennials spent 91 hours per user. This means Millennials are spending more than 3 hours per day using smartphone apps. Interestingly enough, while tablet app usage falls below smartphone app usage, tablet app usage appears to be more geared towards the older generations opposed to Millennials.
More surprising, out of all app usage, Americans and Millennials are spending over 50% of app usage on both smartphones and tablets on the user’s #1 preferred app. The user’s #2 preferred app drops to a usage of about 18% – equating to about 8-9 minutes. Research also suggests that the majority of time is frequented within the users’ top 5 specific app choices. What makes an app most likely to appear in a users’ top 5 selections are the position on the home screen. The home screen allows easy access; therefore, creating vital real estate positions for any app. Some apps utilizing majority of usage include Facebook, followed by YouTube, Google Maps, and Google Search among others. The goal of keeping user’s attention creates new challenges for app developers in order to habituate their users. One of the most important goals digital media companies need to achieve is how to maintain a user’s attention and exploit their habits to ensure their app is home screen material.

Originally Published: 2021-03-23T00:14:21.162038+00:00