comScore: 63 Million On Mobile Internet, 35 Percent Using It Daily

Metrics firm comScore released mobile internet usage data earlier today. It indicates significant growth in the numbers of people accessing the internet from their mobile phones vs. a year ago. The company says that today there are just over 63 million mobile web users in the US and 35 percent of them are online via their handset daily.

The daily mobile internet user population has more than doubled in one year:

I’ve written up the findings in some detail on my LocalMobileSearch blog.

While the highest frequency users are on smartphones and the iPhone in particular, comScore says that 70 percent of the traffic is coming from so-called feature phones (conventional cellphones).

The fastest growing, high-volume daily mobile internet activities, according to comScore are the following:

1. Access news and information
2. Access social network or blog
3. Financial information
4. Movies
5. Business directories
6. Entertainment news

In terms of search, here’s what comScore told me about mobile search volumes (left column is 1/08 and right is 1/09):

Source: comScore (3/09)

If we were to cross reference the above data we’d probably see that these frequency numbers are tied directly to the type of handset that people own: more frequency for smartphones and the iPhone, less for more conventional cellphones. Nonetheless, these numbers are impressive and should get the attention of marketers everywhere. We should also continue to see dramatic growth in both mobile web access and search query volumes in the next several years as more and more people use mobile devices to get to the internet.

There’s more discussion on Techmeme.