According to a study from App Annie, smartphone owners use about 10 apps every day. In some regions, they have over 100 apps downloaded on their phone; in the U.S., they spend an average of one month per year (or 2 hours and 15 minutes per day) using those apps. The United States is a good median for this study, with users cycling between an average of 10.5 apps daily. App Annie reports iPhone owners use more apps than their Android counterparts, but there’s no good metric for which apps are used most, or most reliably: “Among the 10 apps used per day, there is a wide range in terms of how frequently they are used. Apps are satisfying user needs with different tempos, from daily to monthly.” Worldwide, App Annie finds we’re using about 35 apps per month. “On average, between one-third and one-half of the apps on users’ phones were used each month,” writes the analyst firm. “User retention and re-engagement remain key to any app strategy.” [caption id="attachment_141529" align="aligncenter" width="3202"] App Annie app usage for iOS and Android[/caption] Part of the reason it’s hard to nail down which apps are most successful is because iOS and Android owners use their phones differently. While iPhone owners skew toward utilities, social networking and productivity apps, Android users prefer tools and communication services. Similarly, while we tend to use one app more than others, the time spent in that favorite app doesn’t command a bulk of our overall app time. If U.S. smartphone owners are spending over two hours per day using apps, that’s an uptick year-over-year; in Q1 2015, we were using apps for about 110 minutes per day. [caption id="attachment_141530" align="aligncenter" width="2008"] App Annie time spent in apps[/caption] We’ve focused our look at the United States, but emerging markets are even more centered around apps. Users in South Korea, for instance, spend about 200 minutes in apps per day. Those in India and Brazil use over 40 apps per month, on average. Since last year, total app usage has increased 25 percent; App Annie pinpoints emerging markets and an “exploding” global market as reasons for such impressive growth.