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December 19, 2017 - Notes

Shouldn’t We Spend Less Time On Our Phones?

by Antoni Żółciak
More by this author

If you take a look around, you will surely find at least a couple of people on their phones right now.

And it would be easy to say that we are on our phones all the time. But have you ever wondered how many hours we actually are?

In 2016 and 2017, many studies were conducted in order to establish the precise number.

HackerNoon has gathered them all, including the following (and this is not all of them):

  • comScore
  • Nielsen
  • SmartInsights
  • eMarketer
  • MediaKix
  • Pew Research Center

Looking across all of these studies, we can say that the number is…

Over 4 Hours a Day

Mobile currently accounts for about 65% of total digital media consumption.

In its 2017 Cross Platform Future in Focus report, comScore concludes that an average American adult spends 2 hours and 51 minutes on his or her smartphone daily.

eMarketer, in its mobile research study, declares that the total time may be even higher: 4 hours and 5 minutes per day.

Research conducted by Flurry kicks the number up a bit, declaring that US customers spend over 5 hours per day on their mobile devices. Mobile phones account for 4 hours and 15 minutes of that time.

Interested in more statistics?

Imagine Taking Back Just One Hour

We can’t be the first to throw a stone here.

After all, we are in the mobile business. Chances are, we spend even more time on our phones.

But you know what?

Imagine what you could do with just one hour you take backfrom on-screen time. Don’t cheat: we know that you’re not spending all the mobile time on work.

You just don’t.

It’s not about judging your escapism.

An Average Human Will Spend About 5 Years and 4 Months On Social Media

Compare this to the amount of time we spend on other common daily activities:

  • 3 years and 5 months on eating and drinking
  • 1 year and 10 months on grooming
  • 1 year and 3 months on socializing
  • 6 months on doing laundry

We need to admit that, according to MediaKix, we spend around 2 hours per day on YouTube, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and Twitter.

66% of that time, according to comScore, is spent on smartphones – which means that over an hour of your day is dedicated to (possibly) mindless scrolling through social media.

See Where We’re Going With That “Take Back An Hour” Thing?

Here’s what you can do instead:

  • Get on with that physical workout
  • Plan a family dinner
  • Meet with an old friend, or a neglected relative
  • Plan a romantic evening with your significant other – even before Holidays!
  • Come up with some fun bedtime stories for your kids
  • Plan a weekend family getaway
  • Look for funny Holidays outfits
  • Volunteer for a charity

This Holidays, Stay Connected

But not to the Internet.

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