Apple still number one among US teens

Despite claims by everyone from the Wall Street Journal to the company's own co-founder Steve Wozniak that Apple is losing its cool, the latest Piper Jaffray teen survey shows that, in the US at least, the iPhone is still the most sought-after smartphone among teenagers.

Despite claims by everyone from the Wall Street Journal to the company's own co-founder Steve Wozniak that Apple is losing its cool, the latest Piper Jaffray teen survey shows that, in the US at least, the iPhone is still the most sought-after smartphone among teenagers.

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The bi-annual "Taking Stock of Teens" report, published this week, discovered that 48 percent of US teens already own an iPhone (up from 40% six months ago) and that 62 percent of the 5200 respondents plan on making the iPhone their next mobile device purchase. When asked specifically what type of phone (in terms of operating system) they next intended to buy, 59 percent answered Apple, compared with 21 percent who intended to buy an Android phone.

The results were even worse for BlackBerry and Microsoft. "Don't care" scored more highly with 11 percent, than either operating system. Only 2 percent of teens would consider a BlackBerry as their next phone and 5 percent a handset that runs the Windows Phone 8 OS. In all, a staggering 91 percent of all respondents said that a smartphone would be their next high-tech purchase.

The survey, which used a combination of classroom visits and electronic questionnaires, targeted 1600 teens from high income families and 3600 teenagers from average income families.

Of the results, Piper Jaffray senior analyst Gene Munster said: "We believe that despite the push from competitive products, particularly from Samsung, it appears Apple has solidly remained the platform of choice for teens."