Tag: china smartphones

Mobile phones are used for internet access by half the Chinese population

| January 28, 2016

According to a recent report, approximately 620 million people in China use smartphone to go online.

A new official report from the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) has said that around 620 million people in the country – about half of its population – use their mobile phones in order to access the web.

These figures were collected throughout last year and represented the statistics as of the end of December 2015.

This figure represents an increase of 63.03 million users of mobile phones for accessing the internet, last year. It is also a figure that represents about 90.1 percent of the total number of internet users in China, which is estimated to be 688 million. This helps to further illustrate the importance of mobile devices as a driver in the internet user population in China. Smartphones have allowed the country to achieve the highest internet using population in the world, by far, said the CNNIC.

That said, it is important to note that the users of those mobile phones experience the same online restrictions.

Mobile Phone Use in ChinaThe Chinese government imposes strict controls over the content that is permitted online. Despite the fact that e-commerce is among the core components of its efforts to convert its economy into one that is more consumer demand based, these regulations remain. In fact, the system currently in place has been called the “Great Firewall of China”, blocking out any content it has determined to be politically sensitive.

The CNNIC report showed that there are about 127 million people in China whose internet access is exclusively over mobile phones. Broad efforts have been made within the country in order to help to boost the internet coverage and, as a result, public services, the standard of living and e-commerce have all benefitted.

The statistics offered by the report have predicted that the number of people who are using mobile health, mobile wallets or online education over smartphones had reached the 152 million, 358 million and 110 million mark, respectively, last year. Furthermore, an estimated 96.6 million people in the country – that is, one in every 14 people in China – used a mobile device in order to call a cab in 2015.

Mobile devices now used by 94.5 percent of Chinese population

| July 23, 2015

According to some of the recent statistics from the country, this figure had been reached by the end of June.

A statement that was released by the Ministry of Industry in China has revealed that a massive 94.5 percent of people across the country were equipped with mobile devices – primarily phones – by the close of June, this year.

That is considered to be an official data report within the country and the stats will be those used by the government.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released the statement based on the mobile devices data from the first half of this year. It revealed that this year, there were an additional 6.88 million new mobile phone users on top of the previous figure, which brought the total of users across the country to an estimated 1.29 billion. There was a 100 percent ownership penetration recorded for cell phone users 9 different provincial-level regions, which included the provinces of Zhejiang and of Guangdong, as well as in the cities of Beijing and Shanghai.

The mobile devices are seen as contributors to the spread of internet access in China.

Mobile Devices - People Shopping in ChinaFurthermore, the number of Chinese users who opted for broadband mobile internet services (including 3G and 4G) rose to the level of 674 million by the close of the first half of the year. It included 52.1 percent of all smartphone users.

That said, when it came to 4G mobile network, specifically, which is the internet service that is currently the fastest in the country and that is above and beyond other methods previously available in the country, has spiked to reach notably higher levels than in previous data collection. By the end of June, the recorded total had reached 24.69 million more than the figure that was recorded only one month beforehand.

This brought the total number of mobile devices connecting to 4G internet to 225 million. In a country in which home computers that were connected to the internet did not reach the levels that were recorded in many western nations such as those in Europe and the United States, this is clearly showing a rapid expansion of faster internet services to people who may not previously have had regular access to them.