UK owns £9.4bn worth of unused smartphones

CompareMyMobile research claims average UK person has 1.28 unused devices they want to sell

UK residents own more than 76.8 million unused handsets worth a whopping £9.4 billion, according to research from CompareMyMobile.com

The price comparison site claims that the average selling price of a traded in smartphone is £123.10, and with 60 million phone owners in the UK sat on an average of 1.28 unused devices each, Brits could make around £160 each by trading in their devices.

Research from Orange back in 2011 found there was £2.7 billion of unused phones in UK homes, but the value of trade-ins has never been higher, according to CompareMyMobile director Ashley Turner.

CompareMyMobile gives a price comparison from how much all the major recyclers will payout if a consumer trades-in their device. It found that the top 100 traded in smartphones made up 88.3 per cent of all trade-ins, but in 2014 the average price for these devices was just £103.

Turner said: “Brits are especially prone to suffering from gadget obesity. People hold on to phones for a number of reasons, most commonly because they don’t realise how easy it is to sell, have concerns with data removal and they don’t realise their old phone is worth so much money.

“Luckily, the mobile recycling market is in growth and we expect it to increase globally by around 20 per cent by 2018. People are becoming more aware of the worth of their old mobile, and as technology gets better the average price of a phone increases.”