comScore is out with a new report on mobile application and browser usage among smartphone subscribers in the U.S. The study found that the number of smartphone users accessing mobile content through browsers and applications now surpasses that of non-smartphone users — in the 3 month average ending August 2010, smartphone subscribers made up 60% of those who used a downloaded application and 55% of those who used a browser.
In August 2010, 75.6 million mobile subscribers ages 13 and older used downloaded applications and 80.8 million mobile subscribers used their browser — 60.4% of the former and 55.5% of the latter group were smartphone users.
During the same period, males accounted for 56% of smartphone subscribers who used downloaded applications or browsers. The number of female smartphone users grow to 44%, representing a 5.5% point increase versus the corresponding August 2009 period. Among the various age segments, 13-17 year olds are exhibiting the strongest growth in using downloaded apps or browsers, up 1.4% points versus year ago to 6.9% of the audience. Those aged 18-24 are also accelerating adopters, representing 16.7% of the audience, a 0.6-percentage point increase.
In terms of the content type accessed through mobile apps, social networking is used by 30%, while search and news applications were used by 18%. Search was the most popular category accessed through browsers, reaching 54% of the smartphone audience. 43% of smartphone subscribers accessed social networking sites via browser, followed by news (40%), weather (36%) and sports information (32%).