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by somenameforme 12 days ago
As of 2021, 78.4% of households own a laptop or desktop, compared to 85.6% with a smartphone. [1] And it's likely driven more by economics than lifestyle choices. It's 50.9% for households earning less than $25k, and 96.1% for households earning > $150k.

The reason PC purchases plummeted is not because people stopped using them, but because if you don't use your PC for high end gaming (or a tiny handful of other esoteric tasks) then one from a decade, or even more, ago will function 100% as well as a brand new one.

[1] - https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publicatio...
4 comments
makeitdouble 12 days ago
> people stopped using them,

I had many co-workers not owning a laptop outside of their work provided one.

There is a mix of a workplace permissive enough of light use (browser/mail) for personal purposes, and most services having an app that can be better than their web site (banks in particular).

Of course most people will have a laptop and just not use it for years, but there's definitely people just not buying one in the first place.

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Aperocky 12 days ago
Ownership isn't active usage though - My parents have their laptops (and probably 4+, since they do have retired ones stashed), but just don't use it, especially now that they retired.
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wongarsu 12 days ago
Exactly. I know people who own both phone and laptop, but the phone is used daily while the laptop is used a couple times a year. Mostly for writing letters, using some tax software, etc
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smallerize 12 days ago
I don't know if the economic argument helps here, since you can buy 2-5 laptops for the price of a folding phone.
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alsetmusic 11 days ago
My mother had an iMac that we bought for her (to replace the old one that wasn't receiving security updates) that remained in a box for two years because she was afraid of the upgrade complexity. There was none. Her whole computing life was Hotmail and web surfing.

She told me she loves her iPad for web stuff. I sent her one of my old MacBook Airs because she wanted a laptop. I don't know that she ever uses it. I sent an email asking once. She didn't reply. There are two full-blown Macs in her home. They don't count for anything.

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