The UK leads Europe when it comes to maps on smartphones, according to new research from comScore. Its MobiLens and MMX services have been looking at smartphone and computer usage in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom.
Overall, an average 35% of smartphone users and 49.5% of computer users had accessed mapping sites across the EU5 countries. Smartphone map users had increased by 55% during the past year, with map use on computers increasing by 8%.
The UK was the top market for map use on smartphones at 40.2%, while France was top for computers with 53.4%.
Hesham Al-Jehani, European mobile product manager at comScore, said “Smartphones are quickly becoming the primary platform for on-the-go services such as maps and navigation. With apps such as Google Maps coming pre-installed on many phones it’s becoming second nature for many of us to rely on the smart device in our pocket to show us the way. The days of checking routes in advance and printing maps to take with us will soon be in our rear view mirror.”
When smartphone usage was measured according to operating systems, 53.4% of European iPhone users had accessed maps on their phones, along with 39.8% of Android owners, 34.5% of Microsoft users (Windows Phone / Windows Mobile) and 24.5% of RIM BlackBerry users.