Mobile Phone Gaming On the Rise

Annual digital gaming survey conducted by media company reveals a large jump in the number of people gaming on their cell phones.

Mobile phone gaming is on the rise, according to Ziff Davis Media’s annual “Digital Gaming in America” survey. The number has jumped from 16.3 million people last year to 27.9 million this one.

The survey, conducted amongst more than 1,500 U.S. households by the Strategy Group, showed that mobile phone gamers spend on average 19 minutes per gaming session. Cash wise, they’ve spent $13 on average on these types of games in the last 60 days, while hard core gamers have spent slightly more at $19.

More interesting is that 86% of those surveyed already own a cell phone and, amongst this group, almost half play mobile phone games.

Also revealed in the survey were some statistics on portable gaming devices. Four out of ten gamers are considering purchasing one of these types of devices in the next year. While the Nintendo DS currently is at the top of the “next-gen portable gaming market”, said Ziff Davis, Sony’s PSP looks poised to strike. While only 3% of gamers own a PSP now, 14% said they plan to buy one in the next year. In the DS camp meanwhile, 6% of gamers currently own one, but only 6% say they plan to buy one in the next 12 months.