Mobile devices, especially the iPad, are having a major impact on email viewship. No surprise there, as the Apple table is disrupting lots of areas.

Return Path (http://www.returnpath.com), an email certification and reputation monitoring company, has announced the findings from its second global report on the impact mobile is having on email viewership. The study looks at data from April 2011 to September 2011 and examines rapidly shifting trends.

In this latest report, Return Path data shows a pattern of increasing usage that’s hard to ignore as email opens on mobile devices grew by 34% compared with the previous six month period. While webmail maintains its status as the most popular platform for reading email, mobile is showing huge growth rates whereas the relative number of opens on webmail and desktop decreased by 11% and nearly 9.5%, respectively.

With the slick email interface of the iPad making it easy for email consumption on the go, use of iPads skyrocketed with an increase of 73% in email views on iPad devices between April and September of 2011. Email views on the iPad jumped by 12% between March, with the launch of the iPad 2, and April, continuing to steadily climb upward.

By the way, where email is viewed is heavily influenced by when it is viewed, with desktop ruling the weekdays and mobile spiking on the weekends. Return Path’s research found a steep drop in desktop usage over the weekend, with a corresponding rise in mobile and webmail use.

Monday is equally strong for both webmail and desktop but the worst day of the week for mobile email. This study saw a difference in weekend use from the previous six months -- whereas previously there had been a pop in webmail use on Sunday and a dip in mobile, in this study, Return Path found mobile and webmail use to be pretty consistent on both Saturday and Sunday.

-- Dennis Sellers