Almost four million Australians have downloaded or used a smartphone or tablet app, with the ‘Sydney Morning Herald’ and ‘The Age’ the most popular.

According to Roy Morgan ‘single source’ research data (January-November 2011), 746,000 Australians aged 14 or over downloaded a newspaper/magazine app. Although this group is only four per cent of the Australian population in this age group, it accounts for 19 per cent of the total.

Among those who downloaded one of these apps in the last four weeks, the ‘Sydney Morning Herald’ boasts the highest number of users (121,000), 36 per cent more than its Melbourne stablemate, ‘The Age’ which ranked number two.

Next most popular was ‘The Australian”, which just edged out the ‘New York Times’ for third place.

*Source: Roy Morgan Single Source, January-November 2011 (n = 17,253). Usage based on ‘used listed apps on mobile phone or tablet computer in the last four weeks’. Apps during the 11-month survey period include: The Australian, Australian Financial Review, Sydney Morning Herald, Daily Telegraph, The Age, Herald Sun, Courier Mail, Adelaide Advertiser, West Australian, Economist, New York Times, The Daily, International Herald Tribune, Times of London, Wall Street Journal, New Yorker, Martha Stewart Living, Time, Newsweek, Australian Women’s Weekly, Gourmet Traveller, Marie Claire, Magshop, The Monthly, APC Magazine, Shop Til You Drop, GQ Magazine, Fortune, O Oprah Magazine, Vogue (UK), Wired (UK), Other Newspaper/Magazine Apps.

While the top three most popular Newspaper/Magazine Apps are produced by Australian newspapers, the remaining Apps that complete the top five – New York Times and The Economist (Asia/Pacific) – are not based on Australian mastheads. Looking at the user demographic profiles for the top two Newspaper/ Magazine Apps, the data indicates that the vast majority of users live in NSW/ACT and Victoria.  As shown in the following table, although a Melbourne-based newspaper, 16 per cent of the The Age App users live outside of Victoria, with nine per cent in NSW/ACT alone.  Similarly, 15 per cent of Sydney Morning Herald App users do not live in NSW/ACT; in fact eight per cent of Sydney Morning Herald App users live in WA.

In terms of App user media consumption, both Sydney Morning Herald and The Age App users are more likely to be heavy internet users and heavy-medium consumers of newspapers and magazines, the survey found.

George Pesutto, media industry director at Roy Morgan Research, says: “Given the proliferation of Apps and the multitude of uses available, access to the latest news is clearly a popular function, especially when you consider that almost one in five Australians who have ever downloaded an App have actually downloaded a newspaper or magazine App.

“As smartphone and tablet penetration in Australia continues to increase, we would expect to see a corresponding growth in the number of users of newspaper and magazine Apps.

“What we’re seeing now is that Apps are contributing to a broader media repertoire amongst heavy consumers of news media”.

Full Details: http://www.roymorgan.com/news/press-releases/2012/1570