iPad keeps Apple in lead, iPhone and Android tie for mobile ad impressions

SAN MATEO, USA: Opera Mediaworks, the world's largest mobile ad platform, released its Q3 State of Mobile Advertising report, sharing insights based on data from its platform, which serves 60 billion ad impressions per month and reaches 400 million consumers.

This quarter's special focus is around the Sports category and how segmentation within the category produces the kind of granularity from which advertisers can benefit. As with past reports, this edition also includes data on mobile ad traffic and monetization by device, geography and publisher category.

Highlights from the report:

* No summer slump for mobile advertising. Typically the company sees a slight dip in mobile ad impressions on its platform during the summer months, but, this year, there was still an upward swing, attributed to growth from international markets.

* iOS captured 44 percent of the impressions and 50 percent of revenue. Apple's operating system dominates, but the lead is mainly due to the success of the iPad. Removing tablets, iPhone (31 percent) and Android (30.3 percent) are closely tied for volume of impressions.

* Tablet market share has doubled in one year. Together, the iPad and Android tablets make up nearly 10 percent of all impressions served. One year ago (Q3 2012), tablets accounted for just 5 percent of total impressions.

* Music, video and media recaptures lead in monetization. Taking back its no. 1 ranking that it had lost to Sports, this quarter, $0.20 of every dollar made on the platform is in this category. It also led in impression volume, with 23 percent of the total.

* Baseball, hockey and football fans have different mobile patterns. Fans consuming content specific to these three sports demonstrate variations in device preference and weekly usage patterns. There are also marked differences in the types of advertisers who seek the attention and engagement of these three groups. For example, baseball fans prefer iPhones and view ads for cars, insurance, gadgets and personal finance products.

* Game schedules, seasons impact mobile traffic and engagement. Sports traffic peaks on weekends, but engagement is higher towards the end of the work week. Traffic to sport-specific content can drop in excess of 90 percent when a sport goes into its "off" season.

"This quarter saw many new trends as growth jumped and monetization on mobile categories broadened, among other things," says Mahi de Silva, CEO, Opera Mediaworks. "As we head into the busiest time of the year for advertisers in Q4, we will see exciting new formats that incorporate video and voice technologies slated to run in the last quarter of the year."