Americans Now Answer Less Than Half of All Calls They Receive on their Mobile Phones

Hiya’s “State of the Phone Call” Report Reveals Continued Implications Unwanted Robocalls Have on Consumer Phone Behavior; Spam Calls Grew to 25.3 billion in the First Half of 2019, up 128% Compared to Last Year

SEATTLE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Hiya, the industry leader in nuisance and scam call protection, today released findings showing that as robocalls continue to rise, Americans are using their mobile phones less and less to make and receive calls. According to Hiya’s analysis, spam calls grew to 25.3 billion in the first half of 2019, up 128% compared to the same period last year, and nearly reaching the 26.3 billion robocalls Americans received in all of 2018. The average number of spam calls a consumer receives has more than doubled in the last six months, up to 16 per month compared to seven at the end of last year. Simultaneously, the number of calls being picked up has dropped to less than one in two (48%), a four percent decline since Hiya initially released the State of the Phone Call report in January. The number of calls Americans make is being impacted as well. On average, people make and receive a total of 178 calls per month, a 17% decrease since the beginning of the year.

“It should come as no surprise that the pervasiveness of spam calls is having an impact on how Americans use their phones. Now less than one in two phone calls is answered,” said Alex Algard, CEO of Hiya. “At the same time, there’s been a significant increase in pick up rate for calls that are identified as legitimate businesses. This shows that trust in who is on the other end of the phone is absolutely paramount to consumers these days.”

Over the first half of the year, Hiya found that 69% of calls identified as a legitimate business were picked up by consumers, a 16% increase from the beginning of the year. Calls from businesses to consumers have also nearly doubled in duration, lasting an average of 2 minutes and 53 seconds, up from 54 seconds in January. While robocalls have made people wary of answering their phones, it’s still the preferred form of communication for many industries, from healthcare to financial services to education, which underscores the importance of accurately identifying both unwanted and wanted calls.

Below are some key findings from Hiya’s Half-Yearly State of the Phone Call report, which includes data surrounding scam and nuisance calls:

Average calls per month:

On average, people make and receive a total of 178 calls per month

Of those 178 total calls, 93 are calls received and 85 are calls made

Of those calls, 46 of them are from numbers “not saved to contacts”

Average incoming call pick-up rates:

48% of all calls received are answered

71% of calling numbers that are “saved in contacts” are answered

69% of calls identified with a business name are answered

26% of unidentified calls are answered

11% of calls identified as spam are answered

Typical duration of phone calls:

Spam calls: 12 seconds

Unidentified calls: 31 seconds

Identified calls from businesses: 2 minutes and 53 seconds

Calls from a user’s contact list: 5 minute and 9 seconds

Top business industries calling mobile phones ranked in order of total call volume:

Health Care: doctor’s offices, hospitals, pharmacies

Financial Services: banks, credit unions, debt collectors

Insurance: home, life, health, auto

Government: schools, government agencies

Automotive: car dealerships, car repair

Unwanted robocall stats and spam trends for the first half of the year:

Total number of robocalls placed in first half of 2019: 25.3 Billion

Growth in Robocalls year over year: 128%

Average number of monthly unwanted calls received per person: 16

For more details from the State of the Phone Call Report, including top unwanted call categories, top phone scams, top area codes targeted by spammers, and more, please click here.

Hiya’s products and services are available via the market leading AT&T Call Protect which is available for iPhone and Android here. Hiya is also available for iOS users via the App Store and Android users via Google Play. To learn more about Hiya, visit www.hiya.com.

About Hiya

Hiya brings trust, identity and context to the mobile call. With a mission to provide a better phone experience, Hiya provides users with important context, giving them the right information at the right time. Through analysis of more than 13 billion calls per month, Hiya protects over 70 million users from unwanted robo and spam calls globally. Hiya is available as a consumer app on Google Android and iPhone and is integrated into the phone experience for AT&T Call Protect, T-Mobile Name ID, ZTE Axon 7 and Samsung Galaxy S7, Galaxy S8, Galaxy Note8, Galaxy S9, and all A-Series and J-Series users worldwide. For more information, please visit www.hiya.com.

Contacts

Kimberly Dreisinger
Dotted Line Communications on behalf of Hiya
kimberly@dottedlinecomm.com
480-925-4432