How Often Do You Upgrade Your Smartphone?

 

By Dave Parrack

Smartphones are the devices many of us use to communicate with the rest of the world on a daily basis, whether through calls, texts, or apps. Which means there is always a strong temptation to own the latest and greatest smartphone on the market.

Do you resist upgrading for several years? Or are you one of those strange brave souls queuing outside stores every time a new model is released? It’s time to find out via the MakeUseOf Poll.

Windows Wins

To answer this week’s question please scroll down the page until you see the poll staring back at you. But first, we need to look at the results from last week, when we asked, “What Device Are You Using Right Now?”

Out of a total of 762 votes, 54.3% chose Windows PC or Laptop, 10.4% chose Apple Mac or MacBook, 7.5% chose Linux Computer, 2.1% chose Chromebook or Chromebox,11.4% chose iPad or Tablet, 12.7% chose Smartphone, 0.3% chose Smart TV, 0%chose Games Console, 0% chose Set-Top Box, and 1% chose “another option” not listed in the poll.

Windows won by a long way, which actually comes as something of a surprise. We’re constantly being told that mobile is the future of, well, everything, and yet more than half of all those who voted in the poll did so using a PC or laptop. Add those using a Mac or MacBook and you’ve accounted for two-thirds of the total. Which is astonishing.

Also intriguing was how evenly matched smartphones and tablets ended up being, with the former only 10 votes above the latter. It would be interesting to see how those figures break down into the different mobile operating systems, but that’s a poll for another day.

Comment Of The Week

We received a lot of great comments, including those from Mayagrafix, K.I. Matthews, and Xoandre. Comment Of The Week goes to Rick, who wins a T-shirt chosen from those available through MakeUseOf Rewards for this comment:

I switched over from Windows to a Chromebox a couple months ago because I wanted to simplify my desktop computing. I realized quite a few months ago that I was already keeping most of my stuff in the cloud, and was also doing 75% of my desktop computing in a Chrome browser. I was already deeply enmeshed into Google’s ecosystem – Chrome, Android, their web apps, etc. – and Chrome OS and Chromebooks were becoming intriguing to me. I knew I could do even more without Windows, which I was becoming increasingly frustrated with on a number of levels.
But I still wasn’t sure I wanted a tiny laptop like most of the Chromebooks are, since I already enjoyed using my Nexus 7 for portable needs and like using a big monitor when trying to be productive. Then the Asus Chromebox came out. I loved the idea, and spent some time investigating whether or not I could really make the switch. I decided I could – and I have done so almost entirely now. I really like the OS, and it is fun to watch this fledgling OS constantly improve and add more and more abilities. Of course I use my Android tablet and phone a lot too, dabble with Linux – and at the moment still boot up Windows if I need to use my scanner or interface with my gps.
But what is really nice now is that I can go to virtually any machine, fire up almost any browser (Chrome preferred, of course – especially if I can log in to it), and do almost anything I need to do.

Upgrading Your Smartphone

This week we want to find out all about upgrade patterns for smartphones. We aretalking specifically about smartphones too, but if you’re one of those sensible people who have chosen to resist buying a smartphone you can still get involved thanks to the answer included just for you.

New smartphones are being released all the time, and the range of options open to anyone looking to upgrade can be overwhelming. This makes it all the more tempting to upgrade before your contract comes to an end. If you upgrade randomly rather than following any kind of pattern then just tell us for how long you held onto your previous phone.

The last time we ran this poll, back in September 2012, the majority answered “Every two years, I tend to skip a model.” We’re interested to see if we get the same result this time around, or whether the increased ubiquitousness of smartphones has led to a change.

How Often Do You Upgrade Your Smartphone?

Every Six MonthsEvery YearEvery 18 MonthsEvery Two YearsEvery Three Years Or MoreOnly When Absolutely NecessarySmartphone, What Smartphone?

VoteView ResultsPolldaddy.com

Please let us know how often you upgrade your smartphone by voting in the poll above and then take to the comments below to explain why this is the case. Remember, there’s an awesome T-shirt in it for the person responsible for the coveted Comment Of The Week.

Image Credit: Karlis Dambrans via Flickr Source: www.makeuseof.com