United Kingdom smartphone panelists spend the most time with mobile social media out of all the participants in seven Arbitron Mobile-based measurement services in the United States, Europe and Asia.

U.K. social media fans—86 percent of the U.K. smartphone panel—posted, tweeted, and updated their status across more than a dozen top social media apps for an average of 10 hours and 56 minutes in the month of January. These panelists also socialized on the web (by browser or via in-app web links) an additional two hours and 43 minutes in January 2013.

In the U.S. and Europe, an equivalent share of smartphone panelists—low- to mid-80 percent—use both dedicated apps and their mobile web browsers to go social with their mobile devices. The biggest differentiator among mobile social networkers in the US and European smartphone panels is the time spent with social media on mobile devices.

Despite living in the home country that invented the current generation of social media, American social networkers, among the Arbitron mobile smartphone panelists, are behind their British counterparts by almost two hours in the month for social app usage and more than a half hour for social web access.

German and French smartphone panelists lag behind the English-speaking social networkers, spending the least amount of time with social media apps and web domains among the U.S. and European panelists.

The three Asian panels exhibited the most divergent mobile social media behavior.

Indonesia panelists led their counterparts across all seven countries in terms of percentage of smartphone participants—88.6 percent—who access social media via mobile apps. Japan led all six other countries in terms of the percentage of panelist who accessed social media via the web—89.4 percent. Among China panelists, social networking was the least widely embraced and mobile social media users show the widest divide—68 percent vs. 24 percent—between apps and browsers for access to social media.

Smartphone Social Media Access
via Mobile Apps or via Mobile Web Browsers

Arbitron Mobile Trends Panels™ Service, Persons 18+, January 2013
iResearch Consulting China smartphone panel, Persons 18+, January 2013

Facebook and Twitter are the dominant social media apps in the United States and European smartphone panels. 

In terms of the user engagement for social media apps among the Arbitron smartphone panelists, Facebook and Twitter are the dominant apps in six out of seven countries.  Engagement considers both the percentage of panelists who access social media apps and the time panelists spend with the apps.

Arbitron Mobile Trends Panels Service, Persons 18+, January 2013

Sina Weibo and Qzone mobile apps dominate social media among China smartphone panelists

The leading social media app used by Chinese smartphone users in the iResearch mobile panel is Sina Weibo, a microblogging service. QZone, the social media offshoot of the popular QQ instant messaging service, is the number two social media app among iResearch China panelists.

iResearch Consulting China smartphone panel, Persons 18+, January 2013