Flurry: Phablets key to 2015 mobile successes

Looking back at 2015 two things are clear: mobile was important and ecommerce showed strength. But mobile, according to data released this morning from Flurry, was the true king in 2015, with app use increasing more than 55%, and overall usage up 58%.

by Kristina Knight

But mobile is supposed to show strong growth because it is so new? Yes, admits Flurry, but the growth they are reporting on is from established users as well as newbies. According to their numbers the 58% growth rate was from established users while those new to mobile showed 20% usage growth.

The three categories that saw the most growth were News/Magazines, Personalization and Productivity. Breaking those categories down a bit more, personalization apps saw 344% growth (YoY) while News/Magazines saw 141% growth (YoY) and Productivity apps posted 119% session growth (YoY).

The Media categories - News/Magazines, Sports/Music and Media/Entertainment - were especially mobile-reliant in 2015, and Flurry experts believe this is because of the strong uptake in the phablet category. Ove the holiday season 27% of new devices were phablets.

"Growth in News & Magazines apps on phablets was 4.8x that of all devices, meaning phablet users are engaging in these apps at a much higher rate than the average smart device user. A similar pattern emerged for Sports and Music, Media & Entertainment apps, at 4.6x and 4x respectively," writes the company. "We looked at year-over-year growth in time spent and cut that by form factor. Time spent on phablets grew 334% year-over-year (2.9 times more than the average), compared to 117% for all form factors. With time spent on mobile surpassing that on television, and phablets posting astonishing growth in media consumption, it appears that the cable industry will find in the phablet and its apps its long-awaited digital nemesis."

All of this growth, suggests Flurry, points to a strong 2016, too.

Image via Shutterstock

Tags: mobile commerce, mobile consumption, mobile marketing, mobile trends, phablet trends