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Charted: The Rise of Mobile Device Subscriptions Worldwide

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Charting Two Decades of Mobile Phone Subscriptions

Charting The Rise of Mobile Device Subscriptions Worldwide

There were approximately 8.6 billion mobile device subscriptions worldwide as of 2021, more than there are people on the planet.

Yet, while mobile phones, tablets, and other devices have become extremely common across the globe, access still varies greatly from country to country.

Using data from Our World in Data, this chart by Pablo Alvarez tracks the rise of mobile phones across the globe, showing the discrepancies in mobile phone subscriptions in select countries.

The Evolution of the Mobile Market

Before diving into the present-day divide, it’s worth quickly explaining how the overall cell phone market and mobile devices in general have evolved over the last three decades.

Below is a summary of the history of the mobile market since its onset in the early 90s.

The 90s and Early 2000s: The Beginning

The first mobile device hit the market in 1983, with Motorola’s launch of the DynaTAC 8000X. This clunky analog phone cost nearly $4,000 and needed to be recharged after 30 minutes of use.

By the early 1990s, innovation in the industry had somewhat taken off, with various manufacturers like Nokia and Sony starting to launch their own devices.

While this gave consumers more product options to choose from, the technology was still fairly new, and mobile adoption was relatively low compared to today’s figures.

2007 and Onwards: Apple Opens Up the Market

Though many companies introduced mobile phones, and a few launched early tablet devices like the PalmPilot and the Nokia 770, it was Apple’s foray into the market that shook things up.

The iPhone’s launch in 2007, and the iPad’s debut in 2010, ushered in a new era of mobile devices. Their touch-screen design was revolutionary at the time, and they were also exceptionally more functional through the App Store, since users could download hundreds of different mobile applications and games quickly.

This is when the rise of mobile really started to pick up across the globe. In 2007, there were nearly 3.4 billion mobile device subscriptions worldwide or about 50% of the global population.

Present Day: Mobile Devices Are Common, But Not Ubiquitous

In many parts of the world, millions of people rely on their mobile phones and tablets every day for work, social life, or simple day-to-day activities like figuring out directions or deciding what to make for dinner.

Yet, while overall mobile subscriptions have surpassed the global population, adoption hasn’t been equally spread across the globe.

Here’s a look at mobile device subscriptions per 100 people, in 12 different regions:

CountryMobile Subscriptions Per 100 People (2020)
🇲🇴 Macau430
🇭🇰 Hong Kong291
🇿🇦 South Africa161
🇨🇱 Chile131
🇵🇱 Poland130
🇩🇪 Germany128
🇨🇳 China119
🇺🇸 United States106
🇨🇦 Canada85
🇮🇳 India83
🇨🇺 Cuba58
🇸🇸 South Sudan12
Global Average106

As the table above shows, some regions have a lot more mobile phone subscriptions than people, while other places are lagging behind.

In regions with a surplus, people likely have multiple devices and SIM-enabled gadgets like smartwatches and connected cars. This explains how in Macao, mobile subscriptions are more than 300% higher than the country’s population.

On the flip side, in South Sudan, there are just 12 mobile phone subscriptions for every 100 people in the country. Poverty is widespread across the country, which helps explain its relatively low number of mobile subscriptions. According to the World Bank, only 7.2% of the South Sudan’s population has access to electricity.

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This article was published as a part of Visual Capitalist's Creator Program, which features data-driven visuals from some of our favorite Creators around the world.

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Visualizing Google’s Search Engine Market Share

Google’s dominant search engine market share has prompted the U.S. Justice Department to file a lawsuit over anticompetitive practices.

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Visualizing Google’s Search Engine Dominance

Google is ubiquitous in the daily lives of billions of people around the world, with leading positions in online search, maps, and other services.

In fact, Google’s dominance is so far-reaching, it has led the U.S. Justice Department to launch a civil antitrust lawsuit for what it believes are examples of anticompetitive and exclusionary conduct.

This graphic, which uses data from Similarweb, shows the scale of Google’s lead over major search engine competitors like Bing and Yahoo.

Global Search Engine Market Share

The data we used to create this graphic is provided in the table below. It is global search engine market share as of June 2023, across all platforms (desktop, mobile, and tablet).

Note that this analysis does not include China, where Google and other American tech firms are currently banned, or Russia, where Google has ceased operations.

Search EngineGlobal Market Share (%)
Google90.7%
Bing3.2%
Yahoo3.2%
Other2.9%

The largest player included in “Other” is South Korea’s Naver (0.48% global market share), which is similar to Google in that it offers a plethora of online services like search, video, and mobile payments.

Google Prepares for its U.S. Lawsuit

In January 2023, the U.S. Justice Department announced a civil antitrust lawsuit against Google for monopolizing digital advertising technologies.

Today’s complaint alleges that Google has used anticompetitive, exclusionary, and unlawful conduct to eliminate or severely diminish any threat to its dominance over digital advertising technologies
Merrick B. Garland, Attorney General

The Justice Department originally made several antitrust arguments. Potential actions that were deemed red flags include setting Google as a default mobile browser on Android phones, designing search results to disadvantage competitors, and the company’s ongoing partnership with Apple for its Safari browser. That said, some of the less substantial claims have since been dismissed by Judge Amit Mehta.

Google’s court case will begin in mid-September, marking the biggest tech monopoly trial since United States v. Microsoft Corp in 2001. Google is expected to argue that it simply offers a superior product.

Can Bing Challenge Google on Home Turf?

To answer this question, let’s look at U.S. market share over the past 12 months ending June 2023.

US Search Engine Market Share

From this chart we can see that Bing maintains a slightly higher 5.5% U.S. market share (versus 3.2% globally).

The biggest takeaway from this chart, though, is that Bing does not appear to have gained any traction in 2023, even after releasing its latest AI-powered version in February.

The new Bing is the result of Microsoft’s $10 billion investment into OpenAI at the beginning of 2023, which allows the tech giant to incorporate the immensely popular GPT-4 into its various products and services.

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