Bulgarians Use Internet For Communications, Finding Information

The Bulgarians use the internet mostly for communications and finding of information, shows a survey of the National Statistics Institute (NSI).

Eighty-three percent have used it for voice and video calls, 80.4% for emails and 72.7% have a profile in a social network.

Seventy-five percent use the internet to find additional information for products and services and 74.3% go online to read news and magazines.

More than 58% of Bulgarians with internet access use the web for downloading films, photos, games and music.

Online gaming is not a very popular pastime with only 26% of the respondents saying they played an online game.

Online trade is even less popular – only 16.6% said they bought something from the internet for their private use and 12.6% sold a product or service.

The numbers of those shopping online, however, have risen by 4%, compared to 2013. Most often people bought clothes and sporting goods, followed by housewares, trips and hotel reservations. Surprisingly, people also bought food and drinks, but not much electronics.

Twenty-three precent of the internet users in Bulgaria made an online reservation.

The NSI data shows that around 57% of the households in the country have internet access, which is 3% higher than in 2013.

The most frequent internet users are mostly young males with university education.