53% Of UK Adults Use The Internet

53% of the UK adult population, or 24 million people, accessed the internet during the last year, according to the latest quarterly figures from the October 2001 National Statistics Omnibus Survey.

The survey shows that 39% of all UK households now have internet access, which amounts to 9.7 million households across the country, a figure that has increased steadily over the last three years (see below).

According to the Office of National Statistics, levels of internet access vary greatly between different parts of the UK. Between October 2000 and September 2001 45% of households in London and the South East were connected to the internet compared with only 27% in Wales and 26% in Northern Ireland and the North East of England.

The survey also found that, as in previous quarters, men were more likely to have used the internet than women. However, the gap between them closed considerably over the year and while the proportion of men accessing the internet increased marginally to 55%, the proportion of women surfing the net rose from 39% to 51%. Men still use the internet more than women with 58% of men accessing the internet more than once a week compared with 48% of women.

Computers continue to dominate as the preferred method of accessing the internet, with 96% of adults surfing the net via their PC’s. However, by October 2001 6% of adults had accessed the internet via a mobile phone with the same proportion having used digital TV.

According to the survey, 78% of those using the internet prefer to access the web from their own home, while 34% regularly log on at work and 32% from another person’s home.Of those who had never used the internet 40% said they were not interested in it, 24% said they had no means of accessing the net and 18% felt they lacked the technical skills required to surf the net.

Office of National Statistics: 020 7533 5888 www.statistics.gov.uk

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