Telephone calls in the UK

The bar chart gives information about the total call length, measured in minutes, of three different call types in the UK from 1995 – 2002.

Overall, the local fixed line was the most popular telephone call category throughout the whole period. Both national and international fixed line calls and mobile calls showed an upward trend, but there was a remarkably faster pace of growth in the figure for mobile call type.

At the beginning of the period, there was a marked contrast in the minute number of the three categories, in which people mostly called via local fixed line with around 72 billion minutes. Thereafter, this call type continued to grow steadily in terms of call length and reached its peak at 90 billion minutes in 1999, after which these calls had decreased significantly back to the 1995 figure by 2002.

In contrast, in 1995, only about 37 billion and 2 billion minutes were spent on calls conducted by national and international fixed line and mobiles respectively. In the following years, calls via mobiles increased over the period, achieving 46 billion minutes in the final year, and this rise was noticeable between 1999 and 2002, during which time the use of mobile phones tripled. National and international fixed line calls grew steadily to 61 billion minutes at the end of the period, though the growth slowed over the last two years.