Report: App Session Times Run Longer On Tablets, But App Usage Is More Frequent On Smartphones

In conjunction with the launch of the Adobe Mobile Services for its Marketing Cloud platform, Adobe has released an app engagement report based on data from more than 600 brands.

According to the Adobe Digital Index report, app session times on tablets run nearly twice as long as app sessions on smartphones, even though apps are more frequently used on smartphones.

Adobe claims the average app session time for tablet users lasts 24 minutes, while average smartphone app session runs 13 minutes. The company found both tablet and smartphone users spend more time on apps than browsing mobile websites. In terms of usage frequency, smartphone apps beat both tablet app and mobile website usage.

When evaluating app usage by market, Adobe discovered Financial apps were the most popular, leading over media, retail, B2B and travel apps.

While they ranked the least popular of apps by market, Travel apps led when it came to app session times, with consumers spending, on average, more than 20 minutes using a Travel app.

Adobe also looked at app usage by device and found Android apps are used 40 percent more often, but iOS app sessions run twice as long as Android sessions, with an average iOS session time lasting 18.9 minutes. According to Adobe:

On average Android apps are used 40% more often, but iOS apps still get twice as much time spent per month. Android users seem to be downloading more apps, but discard them after they open them the first time.

Adobe’s report supports the launch of its Adobe Mobile Services, a new platform that is part of the Adobe Marketing Cloud and integrates with Adobe Analytics and Adobe Target.

According to the announcement, customers with an Adobe Analytics or Adobe Target license can access the Mobile Services user interface and gain access to its various features, including: geo-location targeting to locate mobile app users based on their GPS location, app analytics and optimization support, and data privacy settings.

Adobe says it expects to release the Adobe Campaign and Adobe Experience Manager in 2014.