State of the Mobile Web, September 2008
Another month has come and gone, and we welcome another State of the Mobile Web report. This month, we take a look at Africa, where mobile penetration and the mobile Web are exploding. And, although we planned this snapshot several months ago, serendipity struck: usage in Egypt has skyrocketed over the intervening months and nudged the country ahead of Germany for the 10th spot in our top countries list.
However, Egypt is not the only country in Africa where we have seen incredible growth rates. All across the continent, usage of Opera Mini and the mobile Web is up 180% from January 2008.
Beyond the numbers and the gaudy percentages, we see how quickly the landscape of mobile communication is changing. High mobile-penetration rates compared to low PC-penetration rates indicate mobile will be the platform for the Web in the future, and with the Web comes the opportunity for easy and equitable access to information.
From our perspective, we feel a deep responsibility to make the Web a reality for anyone. This central value dates back to our founding. In fact, our original tag line was "Internet for all." We hope that Opera Mini will continue to make the Web and, with it, the boundless opportunities to discover, share and communicate, available and affordable to millions more.
Kind Regards,
Jon S. von Tetzchner
CEO, Opera Software
Highlights
- Usage, page views and data transfers rose again this month; 19 million users viewed 4.5 billion pages in September 2008.
- Egypt became the second African country behind South Africa to join the top 10 countries. It displaced Germany this month.
- Top 10 sites saw a great deal of churn in Indonesia, China and South Africa, as three new sites made the top 10 in each country. Of course, this moves directly against the prevailing trend just last month when we noted the top 10 sites were beginning to stabilize.
Part 1: Growth
Number of Users
In September, Opera Mini was used by approximately 19 million users, a 10.1% month-on-month increase from August 2008 and more than 341% compared to September 2007.
Pages Transcoded
Opera Mini users viewed more than 4.5 billion pages in September. Each person using Opera Mini viewed approximately 238 pages on average. Since August, page views have gone up 8.6%. Since September 2007, this number is up 420%.
| Month | Page views |
|---|---|
| January 2006 | 39,969,125 |
| February 2006 | 70,119,707 |
| March 2006 | 102,386,928 |
| April 2006 | 123,915,618 |
| May 2006 | 155,660,949 |
| June 2006 | 183,518,205 |
| July 2006 | 231,325,050 |
| August 2006 | 268,738,912 |
| September 2006 | 274,840,901 |
| October 2006 | 336,044,711 |
| November 2006 | 378,938,100 |
| December 2006 | 423,503,600 |
| January 2007 | 507,622,606 |
| February 2007 | 540,701,179 |
| March 2007 | 632,313,886 |
| April 2007 | 705,063,025 |
| May 2007 | 767,107,863 |
| June 2007 | 788,283,659 |
| July 2007 | 867,208,160 |
| August 2007 | 907,690,600 |
| September 2007 | 872,028,768 |
| October 2007 | 1,192,916,658 |
| November 2007 | 1,414,205,703 |
| December 2007 | 1,558,566,188 |
| January 2008 | 1,787,235,674 |
| February 2008 | 1,883,751,325 |
| March 2008 | 2,429,200,080 |
| April 2008 | 2,491,451,387 |
| May 2008 | 2,947,979,866 |
| June 2008 | 3,224,286,622 |
| July 2008 | 3,736,244,111 |
| August 2008 | 4,172,941,429 |
| September 2008 | 4,533,894,901 |
Data Consumed
In September, 19 million Opera Mini users generated more than 65.2 million MB of data for operators worldwide. Since August, the data consumed went up by 8%. Data in Opera Mini is compressed by 90% on average. If this data were uncompressed, Opera Mini users would have viewed more than 652 million MB of data in September. Since September 2007, data traffic is up almost 558%.
| Month | Data transfer (MB) |
|---|---|
| January 2006 | 587,826 |
| February 2006 | 759,338 |
| March 2006 | 1,072,662 |
| April 2006 | 1,334,715 |
| May 2006 | 1,831,441 |
| June 2006 | 2,127,142 |
| July 2006 | 2,614,633 |
| August 2006 | 2,979,209 |
| September 2006 | 2,976,858 |
| October 2006 | 3,692,282 |
| November 2006 | 4,124,607 |
| December 2006 | 4,652,547 |
| January 2007 | 5,322,457 |
| February 2007 | 5,573,556 |
| March 2007 | 6,529,736 |
| April 2007 | 7,264,413 |
| May 2007 | 8,093,274 |
| June 2007 | 7,984,642 |
| July 2007 | 9,729,792 |
| August 2007 | 10,379,959 |
| September 2007 | 9,922,367 |
| October 2007 | 12,491,633 |
| November 2007 | 14,732,591 |
| December 2007 | 20,129,575 |
| January 2008 | 23,690,372 |
| February 2008 | 26,521,524 |
| March 2008 | 33,096,381 |
| April 2008 | 35,636,188 |
| May 2008 | 43,095,243 |
| June 2008 | 46,735,465 |
| July 2008 | 53,853,102 |
| August 2008 | 60,399,886 |
| September 2008 | 65,281,686 |
Part 2: Country snapshots for September 2008
Snapshot: Russia
- Yandex remains the preferred search engine among mobile Web users in Russia as Google falls off the top 10 list.
Top 10 sites in Russia (# of unique users)
- vkontakte.ru
- www.mail.ru
- yandex.ru
- www.odnoklassniki.ru
- wapos.ru (up from 6)
- www.seclub.ru (up from 7)
- jambo.ru (new)
- rambler.ru
- mamba.ru (up from 10)
- s-c.ru (down from 9)
Snapshot: Indonesia
- Indonesia exhibits the most churn in top pages, with three new sites in the Top 10 and four others moving up in the rankings.
- Gratisindo.com has made a strong debut, placing seventh in the top 10. Gratisindo is joined by upoc.com and ketawa.com, which have also made their debuts in the top 10.
Top 10 sites in Indonesia (# of unique users)
- friendster.com
- google.com
- yahoo.com (up from 4)
- peperonity.com
- wikipedia.org (up from 6)
- gratisindo.com (new)
- ebuddy.com (up from 8)
- mobile9.com (up from 9)
- upoc.com (new)
- ketawa.com (new)
Snapshot: India
- Google services consolidated their position in the top three, as gmail.com overtook yahoo.com for the 3rd position.
Top 10 sites in India (# of unique users)
- google.com
- orkut.com
- gmail.com (up from 4)
- yahoo.com (down from 3)
- gamejump.com
- rediff.com
- wikipedia.org
- my.opera.com (up from 9)
- youtube.com (down from 8)
- songs.pk
Snapshot: Ukraine
- Yahoo.com returns to the list as two sites move down to make way for its return.
- Football.ua and jambo.ru have consolidated their positions as the final two in the top 10 for the second month running.
Top 10 sites in Ukraine (# of unique users)
- vkontakte.ru
- google.com
- mail.ru
- yandex.ru
- wapos.ru
- yahoo.com (new)
- odnoklassniki.ru (down from 6)
- seclub.org (down from 7)
- football.ua
- jambo.ru
Snapshot: China
- Portals continue to lead the way in China, while three new sites enter the top 10.
Top 10 sites in China (# of unique users)
- kong.net
- baidu.com
- google.cn
- sina.com.cn
- 3gwawa.com (new)
- qq.com (down from 5)
- moloto.cn (new)
- hao123.com (down from 7)
- yaha.cn
- ruanj.com (new)
Snapshot: South Africa
- Wikipedia again falls off the list as three new sites make their way to the list for the first time: news.bbc.co.uk, gsmarena.com and pocketflirt.com.
- South Africa experienced great churn this month, with four sites (gamejump.com, yahoo.com, peperonity.com, and twilightwap.com) moving up from their previous rankings.
Top 10 sites in South Africa (# of unique users)
- facebook.com
- google.com
- gamejump.com (up from 4)
- yahoo.com (up from 5)
- peperonity.com (up from 7)
- news.bbc.co.uk (new)
- mocospace.com (back on the list)
- twilightwap.com (up from 10)
- gsmarena.com (new)
- pocketflirt.com (new)
Snapshot: United States
- Just in time for American football season, espn.com makes its top 10 debut.
- With the exception of espn.com, the U.S. list has remained relatively unchanged. Only two sites, Accuweather.com and youtube.com, have moved down to accomodate newcomer espn.com.
Top 10 sites in the U.S. (# of unique users)
- google.com
- myspace.com
- facebook.com
- wikipedia.org
- yahoo.com
- nytimes.com
- gamejump.com
- espn.com (new)
- accuweather.com (down from 8)
- youtube.com (down from 9)
Snapshot: United Kingdom
- It seems live.com and bebo.com are jostling for position. In a reversal of August's list, live.com and bebo.com exchanged places just as they had done in August.
- No new sites debuted in the top 10 list, with only myspace.com and msn.com trading positions. Microsoft's position is strongest in the United Kingdom.
Top 10 sites in the U.K. (# of unique users)
- google.com
- yahoo.com
- facebook.com
- bbc.co.uk
- live.com (up from 6)
- bebo.com (down from 5)
- wikipedia.org
- youtube.com
- myspace.com (up from 10)
- msn.com (down from 9)
Snapshot: Poland
- Poland experienced very little change this month, with only two sites exchanging places.
Top 10 sites in Poland (# of unique users)
- nasza-klasa.pl
- google.pl
- lajt.onet.pl
- allegro.pl
- wikipedia.org (up from 6)
- wp.pl (down from 5)
- fotka.pl
- youtube.com
- gamejump.com
- rozklad-pkp.pl
Snapshot:Egypt
- Egypt is the first country to displace another in the top 10. This month, Egypt has moved ahead of Germany in Opera Mini usage.
Top 10 sites in Egypt (# of unique users)
- google.com
- facebook.com
- gamejump.com
- my.opera.com
- youtube.com
- bbc.co.uk
- friendster.com
- yahoo.com
- bbc.co.uk
- masrawy.com
Part 3: Spotlight on Africa
In Africa, a mobile phone is a critical communications tool. According to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Africa's mobile phone industry is growing at nearly double the global rate. At the same time, PC-penetration rates remain low and the initial costs high. These factors make the mobile phone Africa's optimum tool to access the Web, so we decided to take a deeper look at Africa's mobile Web industry. We examine the top countries, top sites, top handsets and some other interesting highlights.
Highlights
- South Africa and Egypt lead the way for mobile Web adoption, followed by Kenya and Nigeria.
- Total mobile Web usage through Opera Mini accounts for almost 5 TB of traffic through Opera Mini servers. Because this data is compressed by almost 90%, Africa would generate nearly 50 TB of data traffic per month uncompressed.
- Swaziland leads the top 10 countries in page views, with each user browsing 293 pages on average each month. Interestingly, the Seychelles lead all of Africa with more than 355 pages per month browsed by each user.
- Growth rates are soaring: Libya leads the top 10 with 3780% growth this year. The largest percent increase since January was Burkina Faso, with 59,000% growth.
Top 10 countries snapshot
Other formats
- Printable version (PDF)
- Opera Mini data sheet (Excel)
Related resources
Recent reports
- A quick look at early adopters on Android
- Opera Web Pass insight
- Opera on mobile phones experience record growth
- The top local domains of Europe
Contact
For more information about the State of the Mobile Web report, please contact Pål Unanue-Zahl palu[at]opera.com, +47 2369 2400.
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