Just in the end of last year I wrote about relatively low numbers of mobile Internet users in Russia. Guess what, since then the numbers increased by 2,5% and it keeps growing. Looking at 2011, Internet traffic from mobile devices, actually, doubled.

One interesting fact is that mobile traffic to YouTube in Russia increased by 500% in 2011, which is much higher than the general increase in mobile traffic and much higher then world-wide statistics.

Market of mobile devices and platforms in Russia

Russia has always been a great market for cell phone producers and telecom companies. Like in many other emerging markets, mobile usage, coming from very low levels, has exploded in the last 10 years. The number of mobile phones in Russia doubled in the last 6 years. Today 90% of Russian population own a mobile phone (in comparison, only 56% of households have a landline phone installed).

The most popular mobile phone brands are Nokia and Samsung. Nokias are popular among Moscow inhabitants, while Samsungs – among people with lower income (source: http://digit.ru/technology/20120417/391034739.html – in Russian).

When it comes to platforms used in Russia, the ration looks as follows, according to the latest analysis from Yandex (in Russian):

Smartphones and tablets are becoming very popular, especially in the capitals (Moscow and St. Petersburg), but a lot of people still use old WAP phones for accessing Internet resources (source: http://company.yandex.ru/researches/reports/internet_regions_2012.xml – in Russian):

This, combined with no real possibilities for quality mobile advertising, makes the Russian market quite special. The user base is growing very quickly, but the advertising technology is not yet there. Who will become the “Yandex” of Russian mobile space – Yandex itself, Google ..or? What do you think?

Anna

Anna is a blogger and online marketing professional specializing in SEO and SEM for Russian search engines. To see more of Anna's posts, follow her on Twitter, Google+ or LinkedIn.

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