Most U.S. homes are cellphones-only now, according to a new study that shows more and more Americans are ditching their landlines.
The study, released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, found that less than 50 percent of American homes and apartments had landlines in the last six months of 2016, LiveScience reported.
This is the first time that cellphone-only homes showed up in the majority in a study like this, according to The Associated Press.
More than 39 percent of households across America had both landline and cellphone service.
Many Americans have stopped using their landlines because of telemarketers, who seem to call constantly nowadays.
“We never use the landline, and the only calls I get on it are from someone looking to sell me something,” Matt Lawrence, a management consultant in Missouri, told AP.
Not everyone feels that way, though. Some people like the idea of being able to give their smartphone a rest while still having a landline that people can reach them on.
Brad Cooney, a Navy veteran in Brandon, Mississippi, said it feels good to have a landline just for calls, getting away from “all of the irritating bells and whistles of smartphones. I can shut the (cell) phone off and still have a landline if someone needs to call me.”
According to LiveScience, adults between the ages of 25 and 34 are the most common inhabitants of cellphone-only households.
In fact, in that group alone, more than 70 percent not only opted to use their cellular phones exclusively, but they don’t have a landline at all, not even one that is simply inactive.
However, older adults, like those 65 and up, are extremely less likely to be living in homes without an active landline.
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