Based on new figures released from Reston-based comScore, the number of U.S. smartphone subscribers for the first time surpassed the 100 million mark in January.
The firm said there were 101.3 million subscribers in January, up 13 percent since the previous measurement in October. Google Android ranked as the top smartphone platform with a 48.6 percent market share (up 2.3 percent), followed by Apple (29.5 percent, up 1.4 percent), RIM (15.2 percent), Microsoft (4.4 percent) and Symbian (1.5 percent).
For the three-month average period ending in January, 234 million Americans age 13 and older used mobile devices. Samsung ranked as the top device manufacturer, with 25.4% of U.S. mobile subscribers.
Text-messaging saw a slight uptick by 2.8 percent, with 74.6 percent of mobile subscribers using the service. Downloaded apps were used by 48.6 percent (up 4.5 percent) of subscribers, while browsers were used by 48.5 percent (up 4.5 percent).
Among other types of mobile content, social networking sites and blog access saw the biggest increase of mobile users with 35.7 percent (up 3.4 percent), followed closely by game-playing (31.8 percent, up 2.6 percent) and music (24.5 percent, up 3.3 percent).
