46 per cent of email sent in the UK is opened on iPhones, according to figures released by email delivery service SendGrid.

The data, which tracked emails sent by the the company over two 10-day periods in 2013 and 2014, spanned more than eight billion emails sent by over 125,000 companies, and showed the extent to which mobile has become the preferred channel for email communication.

In the UK, iPhones actually lost out on users, dropping by 13 per cent. However, iPad rose by 55 per cent, and now accounting for 18 per cent of emails opened in the UK. Android usage in the UK dropped by 31 per cent despite its growing market share, suggesting that heavy-traffic business users prefer Apples products.

Across Europe, Spain, Germany and France saw the largest growth in iPhone email access, with Spain growing by 97 per cent, Germany by 92 per cent, and France by 85 per cent. Germany was also among the leaders in tablet growth, with growth of 85 per cent.

Android saw growth in email opens in some countries, notably Belgium, France and Turkey, which saw year-on-year increases of 89 per cent, 65 per cent adn 54 per cent respectively, but globally, Androids share of email opens fell by four per cent.

“In the 32 years since the invention of email, Europeans have taken to a broad array of devices and operating systems to receive and send email,” said Jim Franklin, CEO of SendGrid. “Now, mobile is dominant, but its interesting to see the varying rates of adoption of different devices across Europe.

“The Germans are having a love affair with the iPad while the Brits are falling out of love with Android. Despite the prominence of Mac globally, Windows is a particular favourite in France for email usage. For the first time since we began studying global email trends in 2010, the US has fallen below 50 per cent of email opens for us. This puts us in a better position to provide a lens on email trends globally, and particularly in Europe where we continue to send more wanted email and build out our service.”