78% of Tourists Use Their Phone Abroad

A survey by leading inflight connectivity provider, AeroMobile, has revealed that 78% of tourists use their phone abroad.

The survey, carried out by OnePoll, shows SMS to be the most popular phone service used at home and abroad. Of the respondents, 41% used SMS on a daily basis at home, and 26% while on holiday.

Accessing social media is also popular with almost one in three (29%) active users at home, compared to almost one in five (17%) tweeting, Facebooking or Instagramming whilst away. It’s a similar story with instant messaging with almost one in three (28%) using it on a daily basis at home, compared with 21% while abroad.

Almost one in five (17%) people use their phone to send work emails while at home; more than half of these (10%) continue to do so abroad. Similarly, 19% of travellers use their mobiles to surf the web abroad, compared to 35% at home.

Voice is the only service that falls drastically with 36% of respondents making calls on a daily basis at home, compared to just 16% when travelling. The use of voice is noticeably replaced by instant messenger when travellers are abroad.

The results show people want to be connected wherever they are, at all times. This is also true inflight – AeroMobile figures show a 50% uplift in the number of passengers using their inflight network in Q1 2015, when compared to the same period in 2014.

“It’s interesting to see how connected holidaymakers are and these statistics reflect what we’re seeing in the air. People still want to use their phones to keep in touch with what’s going on at home, even at 30,000ft. Inflight connectivity is used for all sorts, from a quick WhatsApp message to sending important work emails or listening to voicemail”

said Kevin Rogers, CEO of AeroMobile.