Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, August 23, 2023
Summary
Most Americans use a printer at home, school, or in a workplace. However, market penetration has sagged over the last five years, and the divide between printer users and non-users has widened.
This TUPdate looks at the long-term trend of printer usage among each generation of Americans. It addresses the question of whether people born around the same time and having grown up with certain technology are increasing or decreasing their printer usage more or less than other generations. The analysis is based on thirteen years of TUP user surveys (TUP 2011 through 2023) as each successive generation grows, evolves, and chooses the technology products and services they use.
The next generation will not save printers
Not all Americans behave the same. Many pundits espouse that each next-younger generation will be the savior, the ones to quickly adopt any newest technology products and services. However, history has not borne this out, especially concerning printer usage.
Although Gen Z came out of the gate strongly upon reaching adulthood, with 82% using a printer upon reaching maturity, their penetration rate only slowly climbed until 2018. TUP uses the widely accepted definition of Generation Z as adults aged 18 or higher who were born in 1997 or later. As this younger generation met the pandemic and recession, many encountered roadblocks in the workplace and in schooling. Along with those blocks came reduced printer usage.
Millennials, well, are being millennials. Their printer usage crested in 2015 at 87% and has slid steadily ever since. At only one brief point since 2011 has this group of Americans used a printer as often as the next-older generation – Gen X. Millennials have experienced many technological advances in their lifetimes and found ways to leverage what they know in newer ways.
In fact, in only a very few cases has a younger generation used a printer more than their older counterparts.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, March 17, 2023
Summary
Microsoft announced an upcoming service for its Microsoft 365 service that integrates the user’s data using generative AI. Called Microsoft CoPilot, the service will first be offered to enterprises. This TUPdate measures the potential market of those most likely to adopt and benefit from the service.
The Microsoft CoPilot announcement
This week, Microsoft gave one of the most down-to-earth non-announcements among the many major companies exuberantly touting generative AI in some form. The announcement of Microsoft 365 CoPilot demonstrated how artificial intelligence capabilities might be deeply integrated into everyday Office 365 applications, especially those involving some creativity.
Microsoft has many challenges ahead to fulfill what was shown in the demo, including whether consumers, employees, or enterprises will be willing to share their words to be analyzed deeply. Also important will be whether the service adds enough value to counter the risk of getting the results wrong. After all, none of the generative AI tools to date have delivered on the promise of discernment.
Size of the market for creative activities
What we can do today is begin at the beginning – consider the size of the potential market. How many people are regularly doing any creative activities such as those illustrated in the demo? By starting with that assumption, the market size will be conservative. It’s more likely that people who need to get certain jobs done will look for the tool to assist them with what they are already doing. It’s less likely that a new tool will inspire many people to begin giving presentations or crafting videos. Just as buying a shiny new hammer doesn’t turn someone into a capable carpenter, nor does spicing up a spreadsheet make someone into a data analyst or executive decision-maker.
There are fewer potential users than Microsoft may hope, since just under half (46%) of all online American adults regularly do any of several major creative activities:
Use professional creative software
Create graphics/presentations
Create videos
An even smaller share of online Americans regularly uses their connected devices for work-related creative activities. As of TUP/Technology User Profile 2022, 28% of online American adults actively use any of their devices for any of the creative activities identified.
Regular creative activities among online Americans
TUP/Technology User Profile 2022-US Table: CREATACTS
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, March 17, 2023
Summary
Most Americans use a printer at home, school, or in a workplace. However, market penetration has sagged over the last five years, and the divide between printer users and non-users has widened.
This TUPdate looks at the long-term trend of printer usage among each generation of Americans. It addresses the question of whether people born around the same time and having grown up with certain technology are increasing or decreasing their printer usage more or less than other generations. The analysis is based on twelve years of TUP user surveys (TUP 2011 through 2022) as each successive generation grows, evolves, and chooses the technology products and services that they use.
The next generation will not save printers
Not all Americans behave the same. Many pundits espouse that each next-younger generation will be the savior, the ones to quickly adopt any newest technology products and services. However, history has not borne this out, especially concerning printer usage.
Although Gen Z came out of the gate strongly upon reaching adulthood, with 82% using a printer upon reaching maturity, their penetration rate only slowly climbed until 2018. TUP uses the widely accepted definition of Generation Z as adults aged 18 or higher who were born in 1997 or later. As this younger generation met the pandemic and recession, many encountered roadblocks in the workplace and in schooling. Along with those blocks came reduced printer usage.
Millennials, well, are being millennials. Their printer usage crested in 2015 at 87% and has slid steadily ever since. At only one brief point since 2011 has this group of Americans used a printer as often as the next-older generation – Gen X. Millennials have experienced many technological advances in their lifetimes and found ways to leverage what they know in newer ways.
In fact, in only a very few cases has a younger generation used a printer more than their older counterparts.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, March 20, 2021
Do more or fewer Dads use technology products than Moms? If there are differences, which devices are used most often by either? Is there much of a gap in their usage? This MetaFAQs reports on the penetration of crucial connected devices among adults with school-age children (6-17) by gender.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, November 21, 2020
How has the penetration rate of using an Apple iPad changed? How is this different between the US, UK, and Germany? This MetaFAQs reports on the shift in active usage between 2016 and 2020.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, May 3, 2018
Millennials have been getting a bad rap lately, with pundits suggesting that they’re squandering their financial futures on avocado toast or cold brew. While our TUP study doesn’t track café treats, we’re finding robust spending on technology devices and services by millennials. Among millennials, homeowners outspend their home-renting counterparts by far.
Based on our most recent wave of TUP/Technology User Profile 2017 US – millennial homeowners are far more likely than millennial renters to be using an Apple Watch or Google Wear smartwatch. Furthermore, they’re well above all other groups in using tech devices they don’t own – such as an employer-provided mobile phone, e-book reader, or tablet. They stand out for having their nest feathered by entertainment devices such as home projectors and OTT TV devices such as an Amazon Fire TV or Google TV. Also, these digital feathernesters are more likely than average to be protecting their homes with smart locks and video doorbells.
Differences in tech usage by home ownership status are not only about age since Generation X homeowners are also well above GenX renters. Interestingly, the mix of devices used by GenX homeowners is like those used by Millennial homeowners, although at lower levels. Millennial homeowners are a substantial market segment, making up nearly one in four connected adults. This group is only slightly larger than the 20% which are GenX homeowners and 22% which are boomer homeowners. Renters are the smallest share of connected adults in every age group. Among millennials, a higher share is renters than the rate in other age groups, although homeowners still outnumber renters by nearly two to one.
Looking ahead
Millennial feathernesters have impressive plans, with their tech purchase intentions higher than any other age or home ownership group. Their plans which are strongly higher than the plans of other age and home ownership groups span nearly all types of devices: notebooks, tablets, and smartphones.
Home ownership status is less of a factor among GenX. Unlike the pattern among current tech users, GenX homeowners don’t have substantially stronger plans than do GenX renters. And among Baby Boomers, the pattern is slightly reversed. For many tech products, especially the most-mobile devices, a higher share of Boomer renters plan to purchase notebooks, tablets, smartphones, and desktop PCs than do Boomer homeowners.
Notes
For decades, MetaFacts has focused on research technology usage and adoption, and segmented users by a wide variety of sociodemographic and behavioral factors. This helps us support our wide variety of clients, some of who use different segmentation and analysis approaches that change over time. While many of our clients employ proprietary segmentation approaches, others seek to analyze the market using more publicly-available or convenient standards.
Analysis by age is one widely-used view, and often a productive starting point for deeper analysis. In some cases, age is a key component of the life stage, reflecting passages such as adulthood or retirement. In other cases, the birth year is used to identify a generational group. Segmentation approaches seek to identify groupings of people who as similar to each other as they are different from members of other groups.
For the analysis in this TUPdate, MetaFacts categorized online adults into the following age groups:
Millennial adult (born 1981-1999, age 18-36)
Generation X (born 1965-1980, age 37-52)
Baby Boomer (born 1946-1964, age 53-71)
Silent+Greatest Generation (born 1945 and before, age 72+)
In our standard TUP analysis, we often split Millennials and GenX into younger and older groups, since much of the technology adoption varies within each of these groups. MetaFacts continues to conduct custom analyses of the groupings that are the most useful concerning their use and adoption of technology, as well as concerning broader sociodemographic and behavioral analysis.
We’re also monitoring the ongoing discussion among the research community around the possible name of the next generation following Millennials. In January 2018, a New York Times reader request turned up suggestions such as “memelords”, “iGeneration”, “deltas”, or “Generation Z or GenZ”. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/31/style/generation-z-name.html
About TUPdates
TUPdates feature analysis of current or essential technology topics. The research results showcase the TUP/Technology User Profile study, MetaFacts’ survey of a representative sample of online adults profiling the full market’s use of technology products and services. The current wave of TUP is TUP/Technology User Profile 2020, which is TUP’s 38th annual. TUPdates may also include results from previous waves of TUP.
Current subscribers may use the comprehensive TUP datasets to obtain even more results or tailor these results to fit their chosen segments, services, or products. As subscribers choose, they may use the TUP inquiry service, online interactive tools, or analysis previously published by MetaFacts.
On request, interested research professionals can receive complimentary updates through our periodic newsletter. These include MetaFAQs – brief answers to frequently asked questions about technology users – or TUPdates – analysis of current and essential technology industry topics. To subscribe, contact MetaFacts.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, April 10, 2018
Younger adults are moving away from Facebook, even while they continue to use other social networks.
The highest share of adults actively using social networks, although not using Facebook, are adults age 18 to 24. The highest share is among males age 18 to 24, with 15% doing so. That is closely followed by females age 18-24 with 11% doing so.
These two gender/age segments were also the top two Facebook-avoiding groups a year earlier. As we reported in TUP 2016, 14% of males age 18-24 and 12% of females age 18-24 were active social networkers not using Facebook.
Also, this is part of a continuing and growing trend. In TUP 2015 we reported that 10% of males age 18 to 24 and 10% of females age 18 to 24 were active social networkers not using Facebook.
About TUPdates
These results are based on results of the MetaFacts TUP/Technology User Profile 2017 survey, its 35th consecutive wave, as well as previous waves.
TUPdates feature analysis of current or essential technology topics. The research results showcase the TUP/Technology User Profile study, MetaFacts’ survey of a representative sample of online adults profiling the full market’s use of technology products and services. The current wave of TUP is TUP/Technology User Profile 2020, which is TUP’s 38th annual. TUPdates may also include results from previous waves of TUP.
Current subscribers may use the comprehensive TUP datasets to obtain even more results or tailor these results to fit their chosen segments, services, or products. As subscribers choose, they may use the TUP inquiry service, online interactive tools, or analysis previously published by MetaFacts.
On request, interested research professionals can receive complimentary updates through our periodic newsletter. These include MetaFAQs – brief answers to frequently asked questions about technology users – or TUPdates – analysis of current and essential technology industry topics. To subscribe, contact MetaFacts.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, March 23, 2018
The number of connected adults continues to rise in the US. Based on our TUP/Technology User Profile 2017 wave, there are 212.6 million adults who regularly connect to the Internet using a PC, mobile phone, tablet, or game console. This number is up 18.9 million from the 193.8 million adults we reported in our TUP 2013 wave.
While some of the increase has come from a growing adult population, the share of adults actively connected has also grown, due in large part to the increasing use of smartphones. The use of tablets such as Apple’s iPad has also expanded since 2013, although declined somewhat in 2017.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, January 16, 2018
The number of actively connected seniors continues to rise, even while their connection rate has stalled. Also, seniors are very active with their connected devices, from PCs to tablets and smartphones.
There are more American seniors online than ever before. This is primarily due to two factors – rapid mobile phone adoption and the growing number of seniors in the U.S. population. Based on our TUP/Technology User Profile 2017 survey, nearly 44 million adults age 62 and older actively using a PC, tablet, mobile phone, or game console to connect to the Internet.
A market segment often overlooked or derided by the tech industry, seniors have been increasingly embracing technology, weaving it into the fabric of their lives.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
Dan Ness, Principal Analyst, MetaFacts, January 10, 2018
Employees in technology roles or industries are strikingly younger than employees in other US employment roles and industries.
As released in our most recent wave of TUP/Technology User Profile 2017 – our research shows that employees in either technology-focused roles or in technology-oriented industries are much younger than the average American employee. Also, those employed in both technology roles and technology industries are the youngest of all.
Usage guidelines: This document may be freely shared within and outside your organization in its entirety and unaltered. It may not be used in a generative AI system without express written permission and licensing. To share or quote excerpts, please contact MetaFacts.
