The number of active mobile phones in Britain has now reached 76.4 million -- more than the country's population of 61.9 million, says a report by a telecommunications regulatory authority.
More than nine in 10 adults in Britain now own at least one mobile phone handset. Many people have two or three -- perhaps a BlackBerry for work and an iPhone for social use, says Ofcom, the government-approved authority for broadcasting and telecommunications industries in Britain.
Smartphones with music players, games, cameras, internet and email access are now dominating modern life, it said.
More than one in seven households relies entirely on mobile phones and has done away with a fixed line for making calls. And one in 14 rely on mobile handsets for access to the internet and emails.
Some 27 per cent of British adults are smartphone users, with half buying last year.
More children miss their mobile phone more than their home TV, Ofcom found.
One in eight people say their partner spends more time on their phone than with them.
"There were 76.4 million active mobile connections in March - dwarfing the number of people here (62 million). This discrepancy is down to the fact that some people have several phones - or that usage is approaching saturation point," Ernest Doku, of comparison website uSwitch.com, was quoted as saying.