People are spending more time with their mobile devices

(Yuri Arcurs)

People may still be cuddling up on the couch with the television switched on, but these days they are not alone - as smartphones get smarter and tablets edge their way their way into more and more households, mobile devices are increasingly becoming can't-live-without partners in people's home-work-play routines.

Digital marketing and media research company eMarketer says "Mobile devices will claim more and more media time per day, while TV, print and radio will slowly lose ground to digital media" in a February 10 article about the future of smart mobile devices.

Time spent with mobile devices was up by 28.2 percent in 2010 and is rising faster than any other medium says eMarketer, adding that "Smartphone owners, more active with every type of mobile content than feature phone owners, are likely on the leading edge of this trend."

Smartphone ownership is also a trend that's on the rise. By 2015 eMarketer predicts that 43 percent or nearly 110 million Americans will have a smartphone in their hand, up from 31 percent this year.

Mobile applications have been a major driver of the smartphone trend, enabling smartphone-wielding consumers to achieve virtually any task on their compact device.

"Increasingly, mobile applications will define the user experience on high-end devices," says market researcher Gartner in a February 10 report on mobile application trends.

Gartner says the top ten mobile application developments to watch in 2012 will be location-based services, social networking, mobile search, mobile commerce, mobile payment, context-aware service, object recognition, mobile instant messaging, mobile email and mobile video.