Bejeweled publisher PopCap has revealed the details of a survey it recently undertook to determine how many mobile gamers are currently purchasing new titles for their handsets.

A rather disappointing 15 per cent said they buy new games to play on their mobiles, while 76 per cent only ever engage in games that come pre-installed on their handsets. A further 33 per cent admitted they do download free games, however.

The survey - conducted by Information Solutions Group and polling 1163 randomly selected AT&T wireless customers between February and March of this year - also revealed that genre is the biggest factor for mobile gamers in deciding which titles to download.

“Adoption of mobile games continues to grow, but conversion rate (free to paid players) remains low,” said Michael Cai, vice president of games research at analysis firm Interpret.

“Business model diversification is one way to address this conundrum. In addition, more innovative games... and fewer clones and knock-offs are among the keys to unlocking the potential of the mobile gaming market.”