Risky business: Indian smartphone users have a whopping 50 apps on a single device, and they're not even using half of them

• Smartphone users in India are installing an increasing number of apps on their smartphones that go as high as 207 on a single device.
• But despite this increase, smartphone users are only actually using an average of 24 apps on their device.
  
• This exposes their phones to security vulnerabilities and depreciates the performance of their phone.
  
• On the other hand, it’s an opportunity that smartphone manufacturers and telecom operators can capitalise on.

Smartphone users in India install 50 apps on average on their phones. While some stick to installing just five, others have been found to install up to 207 apps according to a new report by techARC.

Despite such a high number of installations, Indian smartphone users are only using around 24 of the apps that they install. The techARC DIGIT report speculates that users installing a high number apps do so without understanding the functionality of apps and the potential vulnerability that they represent.

This is especially worrying since statistics in the report show that nearly half of the users exercise financial apps for their banking needs, digital payments and mobile wallets—and use them on a daily basis at least once to perform a financial transaction.

Even ignoring the threat to security, installing so many apps takes a toll on the device itself that can potentially affect its overall performance and reduce its longevity.

Window of opportunity

When it comes to apps that users actually uses, social media apps lead the way with 76 percent of users engaging with them on a day-to-day basis with mobile gaming following close behind with 70 percent usage.

The trend of over-the-top (OTT) apps seems to be emerging with 40 percent of users watching content on their smartphones on a daily basis.

In the advent of the increasing number of apps that users are installing, smartphone manufacturers will have to step up their hardware game to maintain performance standards. While the chipset is obviously a key component of that, the increase in the usage of gaming and OTT apps means display and audio capabilities have a major role to play.

And then, there’s the battery and the cooling functionality of the phone. The most common complaint of heavy-usage consumers is that smartphone tend to overheat when used continuously and the battery drains all too quickly.

Smartphone manufacturers have already starting addressing these concerns with ASUS releasing 5000mAh smartphones in the budget category and Samsung equipping entry-level smartphones with high quality IPS LCD displays.

The emphasis on design features like the notch and ‘camera-focused’ smartphones may not be the best USP for smartphone manufacturers to follow in the coming future.

On the other hand, it’s good news for telecom operators because gaming and OTT apps are data-heavy. This means an increase in their usage could spell a steady source of revenue — once the dust settles from the hyper-competitiveness brought on by Jio.

(With inputs from IANS)