More People Are Passing on Home Broadband and Relying on Their Smartphones

Pew Research Center says percentage of phone-only internet users doubled since 2013

Are adults in the U.S. looking to lower their monthly expenses, or are wireless carriers just offering better data plans? Whichever is the case, a new study from Pew Research Center revealed that more people are relying on their smartphones for internet access at home and spurning broadband connections.

A survey of 1,502 U.S. adults found that 27% of people do not subscribe to home broadband services and that the most common reason for not doing so is being able to do everything they need to do online via their smartphones, something 45% of respondents said.

Graph illustrating reasons non-broadband users do not subscribe to high-speed internet
Pew Research Center

Indeed, the percentage of smartphone-only internet users, which Pew defined as people who own smartphones but do not have high-speed connections at home, more than doubled from 8% in 2013 to 17% now.

Household income is clearly a factor in whether someone has broadband services at home.

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