Britons spend longer on mobile

Updated 09.04 Thu Aug 14 2008

Britons are spending a record amount of time on their mobile phone.

The UK spent a total of 247 billion minutes on the phone last year, a massive rise from 233 billion in 2006, according to Ofcom's annual communications market report.

The average person now spends ten minutes each day talking and texting on their mobile, double the figure for 2002

One in ten people with a landline at home never actually use it and 70 per cent of people with a mobile and landline use their mobile to make calls even at home.

But calls on mobiles more than made up for the downturn - rising from 82 billion total minutes in 2006 to 99 billion last year.

The average person now spends ten minutes each day talking and texting on their mobile, double the figure for 2002.

They also send 67 texts every month, up from 53 in 2006.

Nearly 60 billion text messages were sent in the UK in 2007, an increase of over a third since 2006 and a 234 per cent rise since 2002.

The report found that people are spending more time - an average of seven hours and nine minutes a day - using communications services, including the TV, internet, mobiles, and radio.

Internet use at home increased fourfold to 24 minutes spent by each person each day on PCs and laptops.

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