WASHINGTON: Despite the increased intrusion of social media in our lives, love for emails remains strong with 60 per cent people checking their mail inbox even while watching TV, finds a survey.
The "Adobe's 2018 Consumer Email Survey" found that consumers are checking personal email every 2.5 hours on an average on a typical weekday and are spending an average of 3.1 hours checking work email.
Middle-aged people (25-34 year old) spend most of their time in their inboxes -- a whopping 6.4 hours per day.
However, young consumers (18-24 year olds) spend 5.8 hours, with 81 per cent being obsessed with work email, even on vacation.
People checked personal email while using the bathroom (40 per cent), talking on the phone (35 per cent), working out (16 per cent), and even when driving (14 per cent).
The time spent checking personal email has increased by 17 per cent year-over-year (YoY), according to the fourth annual survey of over 1,000 white-collar workers in the US.
The reason why email is so ingrained in our lives could be because its manageable -- we can sort, file, filter, and generally get things done.
People are familiar with how to make email work, and they feel confident about the privacy of the data, the survey noted.
Email was found to be the most preferred channel, beating out channels like direct mail (20 per cent) and social media (7 per cent).
However, 37 per cent of respondents wish that emails should be less promotional and more informational, while 27 per cent desire that emails need to be personalised according to the recipient's interests, the survey said.