Adults Rule Mobile Gaming - Even Over Teens!

PORT WASHINGTON, N.Y. - In an average month more than 29 million consumers play video games on their mobile phones and more than 7 million download games to mobile devices - with more adults interacting with mobile games than teens. In fact, consumers between the ages of 25 and 34 not only download more games than any other age group, but also play them more and are more likely to plan to purchase additional games in the future.

In 2006 29 percent of games were downloaded by consumers aged 25 to 34, followed by those aged 18 to 24 (27 percent), and teens between the ages of 13 and 17 (15 percent). The NPD Group, a leading consumer and retail information company that researched these findings, noted a similar trend in relation to game playing activity. Half of mobile gamers between the ages of 25 and 34 and the same percentage of those between the ages of 18 and 24 report playing a game on their mobile device at least once a day. By comparison, just 41 percent of teens exhibited similar behavior.

While these numbers offer an interesting snapshot of current mobile gaming activity, the main reason teens have not surpassed their adult counterparts comes down to the numbers of mobile downloads and game play: compared to adults, there simply are not as many teen cell phone subscribers as there are adult subscribers. When NPD compared the share of game downloads to the share of subscribers in each age group, the data reflect that teens, as a group, are in fact the most likely to download games.

“While teens definitely have a higher incidence than adults for mobile gaming, they still play second fiddle to their older counterparts in overall game play and downloading,” said Anita Frazier, industry analyst, The NPD Group. “And while it’s true that adults currently control the lion’s share of mobile game downloads and play, as more teens enter the mobile subscriber base we’ll see these numbers start to reach parity.”