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Here's How Many Books You Could Read Every Month If You Cut Back Time Spent on Your Smartphone Today, people use their devices for nearly 118 hours a month.

By Rose Leadem

entrepreneur daily

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Klaus Vedfelt | Getty Images

With social media, email and texting at our disposal today, it's hard not to get distracted by our smartphones. In 2016, the average American was reported to spend three hours and eight minutes a day on their smartphone, and that's excluding voice activities such as phone or video calls.

Related: 5 Ways You're Wasting Time Without Even Realizing It

There's a number of other productive activities you could be doing with all that time. How about picking up a book? On average, a person spends a whopping 23 hours per month on social media on their phone. And all those hours you spent on Facebook and Instagram translates into a whopping five novels you could have read, including The Handmaid's Tale, Jane Eyre, To Kill a Mockingbird and more.

That's not all. If you didn't spend an average of 25 hours a month sending instant messages, you could have read another five books, including the entire series of C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia.

Related: The 7 Biggest Time-Wasters in a New Entrepreneur's Day

If you're not convinced, here's an eye popping stat: With the average 118 hours a person spends a month with their smartphone on social media, instant and text messaging, email, photo and video messaging, phone and video calls monthly, they could have read 24 novels.

To learn more, check out MusicMagpie's infographic below.

Rose Leadem is a freelance writer for Entrepreneur.com. 

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