Figures show U.S. has more wireless subscriber accounts than people

• Tweet

WASHINGTON, May 3 (UPI) -- The United States had more than 326 million wireless subscriber accounts in 2012, meaning the country had more accounts than people, an industry group says.

The numbers released Thursday by CTIA, a wireless lobbying group, represent a 102 percent market penetration, suggesting some people have accounts with multiple carriers or perhaps multiple accounts with their main carrier, CITEWorld.com reported.

Many people in the United States maintain separate wireless work and personal accounts.

With the phone market more or less saturated, future growth will likely come from users switching from feature phones to smartphones -- of the 326 million wireless accounts only 151 million are for smartphones -- and upgrading their data plans, CITEWorld said.

Overall, subscribers logged 2.23 trillion minutes on phones in 2012, CTIA said.