iPhone 3G Tops Nielsen List of Most Used Mobile Phones

The Apple iPhone 3G is the most-used mobile phone in the United States, according to Dec. 21 data published on the blog of the Nielsen Company, which specializes in marketing and media information. Nielsen shows the “Apple 3G iPhone,” by which it presumably means the iPhone 3G, to own 4 percent of the “embedded base of all subscribers” for January through October 2009.

Sliding in right behind it is the RIM BlackBerry 8300 Series (Curve, 8310, 8320, 8330, 8350i, Nielsen adds) with 3.7 percent of subscribers. Trailing these pack leaders is the number three Motorola RAZR V3 series, with 2.3 percent of the subscriber base, followed by the LG VX9100, with 2.1 percent, and the LG Voyager, with 1.7 percent.

Contenders six through 10, each with less than 2 percent of the subscriber base, and just fractions of a percentage point between them, are the Samsung Rant, the RIM BlackBerry Storm, the LG Dare, the LG Vu series and the RIM BlackBerry 8100 series, made up of the Pearl, 8110, 8120 and 8129.

Mobile Internet use is on the rise, according to a Dec. 15 report from Morgan Stanley. The sites people are visiting on their handsets? No. 1, reports Nielsen, was Google Search, followed by Yahoo Mail, Gmail, the Weather Channel and Facebook. MSN Hotmail grabbed sixth place, followed by Google Maps, ESPN, AOL Email and CNN News. 

The No. 1 handset maker was the No. 10 brand accessed over a mobile phone in the U.S. No. 1 was Yahoo, two was Google and three was MSN/WindowsLive/Bing. Number four AOL was followed by the Weather Channel, Facebook, CNN, Fox and ESPN, reports Nielsen.

More people watched videos on YouTube than anywhere else, followed by Fox Interactive Media. The Weather Channel, interestingly, was the third place people watched videos. It beat out Comedy Central, CS, ABC, MTV, NBC, ESPN and 10^th place E.

ComScore, another surveyor, reported on Dec. 18 that Apple iPhone OS users surpassed Microsoft Windows Mobile users for the first time in October.  And Time magazine, not operating on a time frame ending in October, placed the Motorola Droid at the top of its 2009 gadget list.