E-mail officially overtakes traditional post in the popularity stakes

E-mail has officially overtaken the traditional post in the popularity stakes, new research showed today.

A study by Internet measurement company NetValue found 550 million e-mails were sent and received by UK homes in January – nearly 300 million more than the domestic amount handled by the Royal Mail.

Alki Manias, managing director of NetValue UK, said: “This is a real milestone for e-mail. Although only widely available to the public since 1995, the e-mail has surpassed hundreds of years of domestic Royal Mail services in a few years.

“We live in a fast-paced world and people want instant communications.”

Figures show nearly 13 million people regularly use e-mail from their home computers, sending 12.3 and receiving 39.1 e-mails on average during December.

The study also showed UK householders top the European league for e-mail use, sending 170 million more than the French and 185 million more than the Germans per month.

A spokeswoman for the Royal Mail said e-mail and the traditional post were used for different reasons, and pointed out that the letters market was still growing by up to 3% a year.

“We fully recognise that e-mail is used extensively but used for very different things than the post.

“E-mails are often used for things like sending messages or jokes round the offices – things that the post would never be used for, so to compare raw figures is not comparing like with like.”