Although the iPad is still relatively new, early indications are that a majority of users are willing to pay for content on the tablet — whether it’s apps or games — and that books and video are the top most-popular forms of media they choose to consume on the device, with magazines a close third. Those are the highlights of a Nielsen study on connected devices released today. The survey also found something that will likely pique the interest of advertisers looking to the iPad as a new opportunity: users said that they spent longer with the content they were reading, watching or listening to on the iPad versus the iPhone (the survey didn’t compare content consumption on either device to offline behavior or content consumed on other devices).
Not surprisingly perhaps — given the iPad’s larger screen — users said they read books and watched video such as TV and movies on the device more than they do on the iPhone. Survey respondents said that they read books 39 percent of the time on the iPad, compared with just 13 percent of the time on the iPhone, and they watched TV shows 33 percent of the time on the larger device vs. just 11 percent of the time on the phone. The iPhone won out for content such as news (53 percent of the time, vs. 44 percent on the iPad) and music (51 percent of the time on the iPhone vs. 41 percent on the iPad).
Watching movies was far more popular on the iPad in terms of time spent than the iPhone, with the largest group of respondents saying they spent between 1 and 2 hours doing this. And the iPad appears to be an appealing way to spend more time with the news as well, which should be good news for magazine and newspaper publishers who are looking to the tablet as a way of boosting their fortunes: more than 30 percent of users said they spent between as much as half an hour reading news on their iPad, compared with just 15 percent of iPhone users who said the same thing.
click for larger version
As far as paying for content is concerned, 63 percent of users have paid for and downloaded apps on their iPads (surprisingly, more than 30 percent have not downloaded a single app for their tablets, which makes you wonder what they are using them for). The most paid-for apps and content are games, followed by books and then music. Shopping and news-related apps are also popular, as well as location-based apps and those having to do with movies.
Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):
- In Q3, the Tablet and 4G Were the Big Stories
- Can Anyone Compete With the iPad?
- Why Apple Hasn’t Sewn Up the Tablet Market — Yet
Post and thumbnail photos courtesy of Flickr user Rego Korosi
