Kolaveri Di continued to be the top downloaded ringtone in 2012 for the second year in a row according to the annual survey Airtel Mobitude.  

According to the findings of Airtel Mobitude 2012 - India recorded over 75 million wallpapers (300 per cent growth over last year) and 150 million plus music downloads this year. While Chikni Chameli from Agneepath was the most downloaded song of the year, its actress Katrina Kaif continued to maintain the leading position in the category of images downloaded for the fourth consecutive year, followed by Kareena Kapoor Khan.

This annual survey of customer preferences is the first-of-its-kind in India to capture the ‘mobile attitude’ of 186 million plus customers in the country and point out the India’s very own consumption preferences, likes and dislikes.

N. Rajaram, Chief Marketing Officer – Consumer Business, Bharti Airtel said, “ The data, based on the usage pattern of the country’s largest mobile customer base, reveals an exciting picture of India’s love for movies, music, gaming and social networking. The study also brings to light India’s increasing dependence on smart devices and data usage as they access a whole host of new services on the go.”

Among actresses, heart-throb Deepika Padukone drops out of the top 5 list, making way for Vidya Balan and newcomer Anushka Sharma. Among actors, Shah Rukh Khan led in the category of Bollywood actors’ wallpaper downloads. While Salman Khan and Ranbir Kapoor continue to shine in top 5, Bollywood stalwart Aamir Khan did not fare in this list for the third year in a row. In the Hollywood segment, Kim Kardashian led in the category of images downloaded and also featured in the top 5 Hollywood celebrities.

In another trend reported this year, wallpaper downloads of female actresses outnumbered the same recorded for their male counterparts. South India showed a strong traction for imagery – with Tollywood sensation Trisha seeing downloads 325 per cent higher than the numbers seen for top 5 Bollywood actors put together. Among sports stars’ imagery downloads, master blaster Sachin Tendulkar dropped down to the second rank as Yuvraj Singh claimed the numero uno spot.  

Popular hit Kolaveri Di (which recorded maximum success ever and triggered 2,10,000 downloads in a span of 18 days last year) continued to maintain the top position in 2012 as well. Though reasonably popular, the worldwide rage Gangnam Style did not experience similar success among mobile internet users in India and could not beat Kolaveri Di’s strong local success. The song Teri Meri from Bodyguard ranked second in this segment, lagging behind by 20%.

Dabangg tops charts as the most viewed movie on Airtel Video Talkies, while Singham led on Airtel Audio Talkies. Bollywood blockbuster and epic hit Sholay continues to be an all-time favorite with customers, who till date, are tuning into the audio edition of the movie on Airtel Audio Talkies. Movie inspired games are the new rage in mobile gaming - Agneepath, Spiderman & Agent Vinod games topped charts and left behind popular games Tekken and SoulCalibur.

This year’s analysis also highlighted a fast increasing customer preference for MobileTV, thus resulting in a whopping 65 per cent jump in traffic experienced by the service over last year. Within the MobileTV category, IPL viewing minutes jumped a record breaking 74 per cent and viewership increased over 46 per cent from numbers witnessed in 2011. Sony TV ranked number 1 among television channels. The traction seen by MobileTV reinforces India’s growing demand for data driven services that help customers get their dose of the best and latest in entertainment.

In 2012, India went the MMS way by crossing the 1 million mark on Diwali and jumped 145 per cent on the festive day for the first time in the country’s MMS traffic history. The Navratri festival topped all events in terms of specialised content download traffic.

On the data side, maximum data consumption on mobile internet is typically seen during the graveyard shift between 10 p.m. and 11p.m. The Airtel mobile internet usage pattern indicates growing customer preference for social networking, looking at pictures, downloading applications, playing games, listening to music, reading news and watching videos. Video consumption is reported at its highest during night hours. Specifically, 3 video streaming and download sites fared among ‘Top 10 websites’ in 2012 (compared with only 1 last year) – thus showing growing popularity of the category.

Overall, Facebook, Google and Yahoo were most accessed websites. Google is most visited website in terms of Unique Users, while Facebook leads all sites with almost 10 times Page Views and data consumption.

An average of 3 million downloads on Airtel App Central were recorded every month. With 90 per cent downloads in the ‘Free’ category, customers show a preference for the ‘freemium’ model. While 65 per cent of application downloads are games, other popular categories including social networking, video and music players, sports, health and other entertainment.