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South Korea Leads in Smartphone Penetration
February 11, 2019
 
According to Pew Research, South Korea, home of the world’s largest smartphone producer, Samsung Electronics has a penetration rate of 94% and 6% have feature phone. In comparison the US, where 81% of those polled have at least one smartphone, 13% have feature phones, and 6% do not have any mobile communication device. The least penetration is in the African nation of Tanzania, where only 13% of the population has smartphones, 62% have feature phones, and 25% have no phones at all.  The worldwide averages for each category are 69% for smartphones, 31% for feature phones, and 8% with no mobile phones.  Between 2015 and 2017, the five fastest countries growing smartphone ownership were Lebanon (+28%), Jordan (+25%), Philippines (+22%), Japan (+20%), and Vietnam (+18%), and the country with the largest generational divide is Greece, where 93% of residents in the 18 to 36 age group own smartphones, while only 38% of those in the 37+ year old category were owners. The 
 

Figure 1: Mobile Phone Ownership by Country

Source: Pew Research Center, OLED-A
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​Ordering the installed base in terms of smartphones, China leads with 1.1b almost 4 times more than #2 India, followed by the U.S., Brazil and Indonesia. India had the most feature phones installed almost 3 times more than #2, China, followed by Nigeria, Indonesia and Russia. These 28 countries have a total population of 4.9b, which is 66.3% of the world’s population. 
 
Table 1: Mobile Phone Installed Base by Country

Source: Pew Research, OLED-A
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