According to a recent report from FreeWheel, 17 percent of its digital video ad views in the UK were served to smartphones in Q2 2014.
What’s the import? Interestingly, smartphone share has passed the tablet share (15 percent). The proportions last quarter were opposite, with smartphones accounting for 13 percent and tablets 17 percent.
What hasn’t changed? The vast majority of digital video ad views in the UK were seen during long-form content. FreeWheel estimated that 75 percent of ads were served during content of this length in Q2 2014—up from 73 percent last quarter.
Q2 2014 saw more digital video ads served via long-form content to more smartphones. But why this shift to smartphones? One reason might be Apple’s decision to join the phablet bandwagon.
“Recent research from Flurry found that phablets were taking a foothold in the worldwide device market, accounting for 10 percent of all smart devices the firm tracked in 2014, up from just 2 percent in 2013,” according to eMarketer. “And while active phablet users ‘only’ doubled—up from 3 percent in 2013 to 6 percent in 2014—they represented a disproportionate share of app activity. App sessions on phablets accounted for 11 percent of the total in 2014, almost quadrupling from the 3 percent share in 2013.”
Phablet interest in the Far East has been lively for some time. Now it appears that the popularity of these devices is rising in the UK.
“According to TNS Global, phablets currently represent 17 percent of all smartphones in the UK,” notes eMarketer. “TNS also posited that an increased desire for smartphone video viewing might be behind this rise. The FreeWheel data certainly points toward that being the case, and Apple’s decision to get in on the phablet act adds further fuel to that particular fire.”