AW Poll: this is how long you use your current smartphone
Since 2018, Androidworld has been investigating almost annually how long you have owned your current phone. Everyone eventually switches phones, if only because the battery can no longer complete the daily cycle. Today we look at how the lifespan spread will be in 2021.
‘Lifespan of phones’
Technology in any form does not have an infinite lifespan, on the one hand because humans are imperfect and sometimes harm their beloved devices and on the other because our technologies age over time. Take the battery, for example, for almost all lithium-ion batteries, after 500 charging cycles, they can only store 80 to 85 percent of the total capacity. If you charge a phone daily, that is the case after 1.5 years and from that moment you also start to notice that the battery does not last as long.
More and more midrange phones are getting a large battery
Even with today’s developments – more and more phones are getting a 5,000 mAh battery, compared to the usual 2,000 or 3,000 mAh a few years ago – the battery will be one of the reasons why a phone cannot last forever. Furthermore, after years of enjoying a phone, other components also start to show age. Especially if you have an (AM) OLED screen, there is a good chance that the screen will display strange places after a few years. In addition, the brightness also decreases, as the light sources actually wear out.
How long you can do with a phone therefore has to do with how carefully you handle the device, but on the other hand the lifespan is also not infinite. If a phone doesn’t ‘go down’ from a fall or other damage, it just depends on how long you can live with the flaws that older phones have. We asked in this week’s AW Poll how your patience is with the age of your phones.
AW Poll: Results from 2021
For the results of this AW Poll, I will make a comparison with the results you submitted to us in 2019. Let’s start with the results of the Androidworld readers who indicated in the AW Poll that they bought their phone less than six months ago. In 2019 this was still the case for 18 percent of the readers, in 2021 this had fallen by 2 percentage points to 16 percent. We see a slightly larger decline among readers who bought their phone between six months and one year ago. In 2019, this was still true for 17 percent of readers, but in 2021 it will drop to only 12 percent.
The shift also continues in the subsequent result – as in 2021, around 24 percent of readers bought their phone between 1 and 2 years ago, compared to 29.4 percent in 2019. If we then look at the readers who bought their phone between two and three years ago, we see an increase of 7.3 percentage points in 2021 compared to 2019, when this was still true for 20.7 percent of readers.
A similar increase, this time of 6.1 percentage points, is seen in readers who bought their phone more than three years ago. In 2021, this group will have a share of 21 percent of the total, compared to 14.9 percent in 2019.
(Much) longer lifespan
All results show that people use their phone for longer nowadays. In particular, the group of readers who bought their phone between two and three years ago has grown considerably. Whether it has to do with the uncertainty caused by the corona crisis or the minimal development in smartphones in recent years, is difficult to say based on the results. In any case, it shows a positive image for the sustainability of appliances and thus ultimately the planet.
What is a reason for you to be able or willing to use your phone longer? Are you currently postponing the purchase of a device, or have you bought a new device faster than expected? Be sure to let us know in the comments at the bottom of the article.
