Netbooks popular among college kids

A third of US students will take one to university next term

By Tony Smith • Get more from this author

19th August 2009 10:39 GMT

More than a third of kids going off to college in the US this autumn will take a netbook with them, a survey of students has suggested.

Some 34 per cent of student respondents queried by US online price comparison site Retrevo said they're going to buy a netbook for their studies.

That said, just under a half - 49 per cent - said they would be buying a full-size laptop.

And while the company said it sampled over 300 people, they were "distributed across gender, age, income and location across the US". That means many won't be students, so the effective sample size will be much smaller than that.

Still, that's a lot of mini-laptops, suggesting that, for kids at least, the form-factor has become mainstream and not a niche category.

It also shows that a fair few students are willing to forego the power of a full-size machine in return for a device that's a darn sight more portable.

Retrevo said respondents favoured computers that are small and light. But it's price that's really the key factor. Around 58 per cent of respondents said they would spend under $750 (£456/€530). Only 18 per cent were willing to spend more than $1000 (£604/€707). ®