Smartphone users becoming more discerning about the apps they use, Gartner says
Six years into the current incarnation of the mobile app marketplace, a recent survey suggests that while smartphone owners have not lost their appetite for new apps, developers hoping to make it into users' everyday rotation have a higher bar to reach.
Thanks to the maturity of the market, users are seen as having largely settled on their core stable of apps, and are reluctant to change their usage pattern. The data, collected by market research firm Gartner, came via a survey of over 2,000 American and German consumers last year.
"It's not that smartphone users have lost interest in apps, users remain excited about what apps can do for them in their daily lives, including for work and nonwork app scenarios," Gartner research director Brian Blau said in a release. "However, app users need to be convinced about the value of the app."
Apps in specific niches --?such as fitness --?may be found on relatively fewer handsets overall, but the users that do have them installed use the apps often. While fitness apps were installed on only 23 percent of handsets in the U.S. and just 16 percent in Germany, more than 70 percent of those were used at least once a
week.
That could indicate that users who find an app they like in a particular vertical may stick with it as long as it works, no matter the advancements made by competitors.
"[Users'] willingness for new app experiences is open-ended, but their plan is to keep their same patterns of use," Blau added. "Users will try new apps, but they need to be convinced of an app's value before they adopt them and change use patterns over the long term."
Thanks to the maturity of the market, users are seen as having largely settled on their core stable of apps, and are reluctant to change their usage pattern. The data, collected by market research firm Gartner, came via a survey of over 2,000 American and German consumers last year.
"It's not that smartphone users have lost interest in apps, users remain excited about what apps can do for them in their daily lives, including for work and nonwork app scenarios," Gartner research director Brian Blau said in a release. "However, app users need to be convinced about the value of the app."
Apps in specific niches --?such as fitness --?may be found on relatively fewer handsets overall, but the users that do have them installed use the apps often. While fitness apps were installed on only 23 percent of handsets in the U.S. and just 16 percent in Germany, more than 70 percent of those were used at least once a
week.
That could indicate that users who find an app they like in a particular vertical may stick with it as long as it works, no matter the advancements made by competitors.
"[Users'] willingness for new app experiences is open-ended, but their plan is to keep their same patterns of use," Blau added. "Users will try new apps, but they need to be convinced of an app's value before they adopt them and change use patterns over the long term."
Comments
I've always been that way, with very few apps. Most of the apps I have are free from big name companies which are tied to services I use such as a bank apps, radio & TV, Google, Uber and some mainstream social apps. I have only a few independent apps such as RedLaser and SpeedTest. The only paid apps I have are the iWork suite, iConvert and Star Walk.
Imagine that! Users are smarter than believed, and they will stick with an app that works, instead of re-investing in a new learning curve for no apparent benefit.
In other news, physicists discover inertia!
I've noticed that I download a lot less apps but my change in habit revolves around storage space. My first iPhone, a 3gs 8Gb, I was downloading apps like a mad man. Then it got filled up in a couple of weeks. Next phone was a iPhone 4 with 16GB, downloaded many apps but quickly ran out of room and had delete apps regularly just to take photos. I currently have a 5s with 32GB. and for the past year and half, I only have 2 pages of apps. If its not essential, I won't get the app. When it comes down to getting the latest game or having room for my photos and videos, the game looses out.
So Apple if you are reading this. Give us more storage space. The more room we have the more apps we buy and the more money you make.
I must be bucking the trend. I still find myself downloading apps just because they sound interesting, and I mean to have a look at them later, but never get round to it. Or look at it, decide it's not what I want, and then forget to remove it.
As long as you didn't buy that ridiculously expensive "I Am Rich" app, you're fine!!