In Viet Nam, social networking is the most or second most popular category with a 27 per cent share, and games come third. — Photo itcnews.vn

HCM CITY  (VNS) — About half the mobile phone users in Viet Nam, Indonesia, and the Philippines still use non-"smart" devices, or feature phones, while all other countries in the Asia Pacific (APAC) and Oceania are making a clear and rapid transition to smartphones, according to a study by Opera Mediaworks and the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA).

A State of Mobile Advertising study of mobile users in the third quarter on Opera's global mobile-ad platform in six APAC countries – the others being India, Malaysia, and Thailand — found that Android is the leading OS for smartphones, with 67.1 per cent of impressions being served to those mobile devices (and 30.4 per cent to "other", or feature phones).

"The ability to serve high-impact – and therefore high-value – rich-media and video ads on smartphones is what is truly powering the monetisation potential of the region," Vikas Gulati, managing director for Asia, Opera Mediaworks, said.

In Viet Nam, social networking is the most or second most popular category with a 27 per cent share, and games come third.

In three countries (India, the Philippines, and Viet Nam), nearly 8 in 10 impressions are served to the top three categories, indicating highly condensed interest areas.

India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Viet Nam all contain a strong percentage of savvy shoppers, with such favorite local sites as Tokopedia, OLX, Lelong, and Cho Tot.

Viet Nam has the highest percentage of gamers among these six countries. — VNS