87% of US teenagers owned an iPhone, 88% would buy again, a new survey shows (Updated)

Yet another confirmation that young people simply adore the iPhone has arrived – this time, it’s the results from the latest survey from the investment bank Piper Sandler.

Apple’s smartphone is the top choice for teenagers and no economic downturns apparently can change their minds and lead them on to the Android path (via AppleInsider).

For the survey, Piper Sandler included 9,193 teenagers across the US, aged 15.7 years old. The results are as follows: 87% of US teenagers owned an iPhone, and 88% said they intended to buy another in the future.

The previous report was in April 2023, and you can say what you will about Gen Z, but at least they’re showing extreme loyalty to Apple: back then, the figures were exactly the same with 87% confirming they’ve owned or are owning an iPhone and 88% stating they’d pay (with their own money, right?) top dollar for another.

What about the Apple Watch?

There’s a difference between April to October in Piper Sandler’s reports on the issue of smartwatch ownership, though. In April, 35% of the surveyed teens had an Apple Watch, which was itself up from 31% in October 2022.

For October 2023, the figure is down to 34% of US teenagers owning a smartwatch from Apple. If the 9,193 survey's respondents account for an exact representation of the rest of US teenagers, that’d mean there would be around 14 million Apple Watches in use by youngsters.

Apple dominated the survey on the topic of payment apps – no surprises here. Apple Pay ranked first in the new report, with 42% of respondents having used it in the month before they were asked.

As far as AR/VR devices go, the tendency is going up: 31% of teenagers now own a VR device, increasing from 29% in April 2023. However, actual usage of VR devices declined from around 14% to around 10%. Maybe they’re all waiting for the Vision Pro in 2024? Remains to be seen.