Mobile Web browsing on iOS devices mushrooms as BlackBerry declines

Computerworld - Web usage by iPhone and iPad owners has grown by 35% in North American over the past year, while browsing with BlackBerry smartphones and the PlayBook tablet has dropped by 25%.

Those Web usage statistics, gathered by mobile ad network Chitika, were offered up in a blog posted Thursday by the company.

The drop in Web use by Research in Motion BlackBerry devices came at the same the company saw a decline in sales. IDC recently said that second quarter 2012 market share for BlackBerry smartphones shipped to retailers dropped to 4.8% -- a 41% decline from the same quarter in 2011.

BlackBerry device Web usage is a small share overall--about 1% of all mobile traffic in July 2012. Apple's smartphones and tablets now account for a "staggering" 63% of all mobile Web traffic, Chitika said.

Chitika studies Web usage by analyzing 250,000 Web sites in North America and regularly looking at hundreds of millions of Web page views of ads each week, a spokesman said.

Matt Hamblen covers mobile and wireless, smartphones and other handhelds, and wireless networking for Computerworld. Follow Matt on Twitter at @matthamblen or subscribe to Matt's RSS feed. His email address is mhamblen@computerworld.com.

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