1 in 5 Smartphone Owners Use Check-In Services

First there were complaints about location services that invaded users privacy, then they decide to turn it into a good thing by asking users to share their location services for a research study and now it seems that 70 percent of mobile users are “checking in” from Android and Apple devices.

A study by comScore found that 16.7 million U.S. mobile subscribers used location-based “check-in” services on their phones in March 2011, representing 7.1 percent of the entire mobile population. 12.7 million check-in users did so on a smartphone, representing 17.6 percent of the smartphone population.

“Although still in their relative infancy, location-based mobile check-in services are seeing rather impressive adoption among smartphone users,” said Mark Donovan, comScore senior vice president of mobile. “The ability to interact with consumers on this micro-local level through special offers, deals and other incentives provides brands with the real-time opportunity to engage consumers through their mobile device.”

It also seems that 18-34 year olds account for nearly 60 percent of those check-in’s. I know because I’m one of them, although I’m still not too sure what the exact appeal is in letting everyone on your Facebook know where you are, although the achievement badges on foursquare make it more fun.