Households internet access and use up in 2018

Households internet access was up in 2018 by 6,8%, while online orders for goods or services was down by 1.1% in the first quarter of this year on an annual basis.
 
“During 2018, there has been a significant increase in internet access in households and reached 86.2% compared to 79.4% in 2017,” a Cyprus Statistical Service press release says.
 
The percentage of households with access to personal computers reached 78.7% in 2018 compared to 75.9% in 2017.
 
An increase was also observed in the percentage of households that own a laptop computer up from 65% in 2017 to 68.5% in 2018.
 
Households without dependent children than own a computer increased from 68.5% in 2017 to 72.0% in 2018, while the percentage of households with dependent children that own a computer reached 93.3% in 2018, the press release says.

At the same time, 83.7% of persons aged 16-74 uses the internet at least once a week. Almost all people aged 16 – 24 years old (99.3%) use the internet at least once a week.

This percentage drops with age, although in the age group 65 – 74 years old the use of internet increased to 37.5% in 2018 compared to 33.9% in 2017.

The internet is used more frequently by people of a higher education (97.3%) compared to people of a lower education level (53.8%).
According to the Statistical Service’s data during the first quarter of 2018, internet usage increased to 84.4% compared to 80.7% in 2017.
 
The most popular internet activities include finding information about goods and services (85.1%), participating in social networks (81.7%), watching video content (80.8%), telephoning over the internet/video calls (74.4%) and seeking health-related information (67.1%).  
 
A percentage of 87.5% of the people who used the Internet in the first quarter of 2018, used their mobile phone or smart phone to access the Internet away from home or work while, 16.7% used a laptop and 11.5% used a tablet.

23,3% of persons aged 16 – 74 years old made online orders for goods and services in the first quarter of 2018 compared to 24,4% in 2017.

The most popular categories of goods/services ordered online were clothes or sports goods (56.3%), travel arrangements such as transport tickets, car hire etc. (51.3%) and holiday accommodation (46.7%).
 
During the period April 2017-March 2018, 82.9% of people aged 16-74 that bought or ordered goods and services for private use prefer sellers from other EU countries, 35.8% prefer sellers from the rest of the world and 34.6% buy or order from sellers in Cyprus.

The amount spent for goods or services over the internet was usually between €100-€500, the press release concludes.