2012 was truly the year of the smartphones. 695 million smartphones were sold all over the world. This post talks about the leading countries in terms of smartphone penetration per capita. It is however important to note that many countries who have a high smartphone penetration are not a part of this graph due to less population ie Finland, Norway, Denmark (each with a population of 5 mn), Singapore, Ireland, New Zealand (each with a population of 4 mn).
The below graphs gives you a look at the Top 10 countries in the world in terms of ‘Smartphone penetration’ who have a population of 6 mn or more.
Note:
- Singapore and Macau track very close to Hong Kong
- Finland, Norway, Denmark and Iceland track very close to Sweden
- New Zealand tracks very close to Australia
- Ireland tracks very close to UK
- Switzerland and Austria usually track near Netherlands
- UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar track usually well ahead of Saudi Arabia
Some Interesting Points:
- Out of the top 10, 3 countries from Asia come in the Top 5 (Hong Kong, South Korea & Japan)
- All the BRIC nations are a part of the Top 30 countries in the list
- If we consider all the smaller countries, as of today 22 countries have a 50% per capita smartphone penetration rate
- 10 countries have a 75% per capita smartphone penetration rate, which means three quarters of the population of these countries use a smartphone.
- Reports also suggest that UAE might have passed the 75% barrier which technically means that countries like Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar have also reached this mark. Hence we can say that the total list is 14.
The Smartphone Population In 2013
Various research reports & studies have said that 2013 we will see atleast 1 bn new smartphones being sold. The pie chart below gives us an estimated regional split of the world smartphone market in 2013.
From the above pie chart we can clearly see that:
- Sales in China will be almost double than that in North America
- Asia, led by China, will account for almost half of all the smartphones sold in 2013.
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