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ABI: 97% of all Smartphones will have touchscreens by 2016


Over the past few years there has been an influx of touchscreens on mobile phones, the iPhone was the catalyst which made this feature truly popular and mainstream. A new report from ABI Research states that in 2006 the total percentage of smartphones that had a touchscreen aspect to it was only at 7%. This number skyrocketed in 2010 to 75% of total smartphones (a report by IDC notes there was 302.6 million smartphones shipped in 2010). This was again mainly caused by the adoption of smartphones plus other operating systems such as Android making it easier for people to purchase.

ABI believes the number of touchscreen smartphones will continue to increase well into 2016, reaching a staggering 97% of all the total market. “Over the next five years, touchscreens will be as pervasive in smartphones as Wi-Fi chipsets are today, reaching 97% of all smartphones by 2016. The screen is the point of fulfillment for all that a mobile device promises to deliver to its user, so there is little surprise in the impact it can have on its success. However, it was the evolution of screen and touch technologies that triggered the markets rapid growth. The more economical resistive touch technology has been almost universally replaced in smartphones with the more elegant projected capacitive technology that was first introduced in mobile phones through the iPhone.”

The important sentence that ABI stated is that the touchscreen has now become “point of fulfillment for all that a mobile device promises”. This is so incredibly true. We connect with our device so much these days, to surf the web, get our email, IM, play games, Facebook, download apps, watch movies and the touchscreen is key to all this interaction. Having a bad touchscreen equals a bad mobile experience.

Apart from the Apple iPhone, Samsung, LG, Microsoft, Nokia, HP/Palm, INQ, HTC and RIM have all contributed to the growth of the touchscreen smartphone market. Super AMOLED, Super AMOLED Plus, Retina display, Gorilla Glass, WVGA, Nova display etc, etc… the trend is increasing and so are the capabilities. It’ll be interesting to see what 2016 will look like, possibly those flexible display will finally come to market.

Source: ABI

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