200 million people who stay up late using their mobile phones: their side life hidden in the night

What are the reasons why modern people stay up late? Most people probably do it because of their phones, such as watching short videos, playing games, and browsing shopping apps... If you are not careful, your time will be wasted by your phone. So, what are the stories behind these people who stay up late and can't put down their phones? Let's take a look at the stories in this article.

• The scale of the "late-night party" with active mobile users from 0:00 to 2:00 the next day has exceeded 200 million, with mobile social networking, mobile video, and mobile game users ranking in the top three in terms of user activity.
• The proportion of people who go to bed after midnight has increased significantly, and nearly 70% of late sleep is related to the use of mobile phones. Mobile phones have become a veritable "sleep killer."
• Different age groups have different nights. There is a story behind every sleepless night and every phone that cannot be put down.

When the clock crosses 24 o'clock, the day for those who stay up late has entered the most perfect time.

Some people click on the food ordering app and prepare to start a feast, some people complain passionately in the WeChat group, some people and their comrades gallop in the Canyon of Kings, and some people are willing to sacrifice sleep and try to "steal" some time that truly belongs to themselves. No mobile phone can escape the watchful eyes of the party that stays up late.

Staying up late keeps the city awake; mobile phones make staying up late have no end.

According to the "2022 China National Healthy Sleep White Paper" released by the China Sleep Research Society, although the average sleep duration has increased, the proportion of people who go to bed after midnight has increased significantly. Mobile phones have become a "sleep killer", and nearly 70% of late sleep is related to it.

QuestMobile data shows that as of September 2022, the number of active mobile users at night (18:00 to 6:00 the next day) has reached nearly 860 million, among which the number of "late night party" users from 0:00 to 2:00 a.m. the next day has exceeded 200 million.

From the perspective of online areas involved in user behavior, mobile social networking, mobile video, mobile games, digital reading, and mobile shopping ranked in the top five in terms of user activity, with active users in the night period accounting for 95.9%, 93.7%, 86.8%, 81.0%, and 78.8%, respectively.

In the fast-paced and high-pressure modern society, staying up late and going to bed late seem to have become the easiest way to escape reality. In the field of psychiatry, there is a term called "compulsive late sleep disorder", which refers to a subjective reluctance to go to bed early, so people use mobile phones, watching videos, etc. to relieve their restless mood until they are too sleepy to hold on and then go to sleep.

Perhaps, the night of 2 a.m. has become the new time zone of this era. From student days to entering society, raising a family, and then to old age, every night that delays going to sleep, every mobile phone that cannot be put down, has a story or even a life behind it.

Snow Leopard Finance talked to some people who stay up late using their phones. Here are their accounts (edited):

1. The few-inch screen is my entire source of life

Deliveryman Zhang Xiao

In the eyes of others, mobile phones are communication tools, but in my eyes, they are necessities for survival. Others use their mobile phones in the middle of the night to enjoy their own time, but I use my mobile phone in the middle of the night to struggle for survival.

I have no other choice.

I am not from Beijing. I came here to work so that my children can go to school in Beijing. My children need money for school, and my family needs money for food, clothing, housing and transportation. No one wants to work so hard, being outside in the sun in the summer and running around in the snow in the winter, but I have to support my family, so I have no choice. As a food delivery rider, my mobile phone is my only source of income, and every penny of my income comes from that small screen of a few inches.

Every order means money, and orders placed in the early morning are no exception, and are even more valuable.

There are not many riders at midnight, but there are not many orders either, so you have to fight for them. If I get an order at midnight, I will be very happy because I can earn more at night. I can earn about 10 yuan per order on weekdays. If it is midnight, long distance, and the weather is bad, I can earn 25 yuan per order, then I will be very happy.

Most of the people who place orders in the early hours are young people in their twenties and thirties. The takeaways they order are usually barbecue, stewed dishes and wine. Many people ask for orders to be delivered in the middle of the night without knocking on the door. I have also met users who use ropes to connect takeaways. When there are no orders, I play games at the entrance of the nearby food city, or chat with other takeaway drivers, and occasionally place orders.

There are fewer cars on the road at midnight, so it is safer for me to run red lights or drive against traffic, and the delivery speed will be faster. Pedestrians are afraid of us, but we are also afraid of cars and accidents. Who doesn't know that running red lights is dangerous? There is no rush for orders at midnight, but it is always better to be faster, at least it can leave more time for the next order. Looking at the route on the screen getting shorter and shorter, I know that I am getting closer to the money I will make from this order.

When I deliver food on an electric bike late at night, it is common to encounter scratches or sudden braking at intersections. My first reaction is to make sure that the orders on the bike don’t get lost, otherwise I will lose both the wife and the army. If I receive a complaint, all these orders will be in vain. I am a crowdsourcing rider, and the unit salary will be a little higher than that of a full-time rider, but if I have an accident, I can only bear the consequences myself, and the company will not help me pay any expenses.

Marx once said: "If there is a 100% profit, the capitalists will take risks for it; if there is a 200% profit, the capitalists will defy the law; if there is a 300% profit, then the capitalists will trample on everything in the world."

I am not a capitalist, and I cannot get 100% of the profits, but for now, these are enough for me to ignore the outside voices. When survival becomes a problem, the most important thing is to do everything possible to survive.

2. One more minute of patience may earn you one more point

Postgraduate entrance examination party Wanqian

If you want to achieve an overwhelming victory, you must make an absolute effort. To do this, I put my sleep first.

I have no confidence in my self-control. I use a mobile phone or tablet without a SIM card to take online classes. I download the course content to the device in advance and try to be a "cave man" who does not contact the outside world. Besides, they are smaller and lighter than computers, which at least allows me to take one more book to the library.

According to the latest data released by the education department, the number of people taking the postgraduate entrance examination in 2022 reached 4.57 million, an increase of more than 800,000 from 3.77 million in 2021, with a growth rate of more than 20%.

Seeing the number increasing by nearly one million every year, I dare not take it lightly. I started studying at 7 o'clock every morning, leaving myself time for nap and eating, and spent the rest of the time at my desk reviewing. It's really not that I'm so eager, but I know that if I don't have the opportunity to "land" this year, every year after that will only be more difficult.

I am a very optimistic person. From childhood to adulthood, I never get anxious because of poor grades, nor do I suffer from insomnia due to pressure, but the postgraduate entrance examination changed me.

Half a year ago, after reviewing all my major courses, I conducted a self-test to find out my basic knowledge. I strictly followed the time for the postgraduate entrance examination, prepared a set of test questions and related tools, and notified my family not to disturb me.

The result of only reviewing once is predictable. The messy draft paper, the dense red notes on the test questions, and the bitten pen tip all seemed to tell me "you can't do it". However, the first review took me two months. Thinking about the time that passed and looking at the double-digit score that was difficult to get, that night was the first time I stayed up all night.

During the nearly six months of preparation, I slept less than six hours on 80% of the nights. It wasn’t that I wasn’t sleepy, but I was so anxious about the pressure of school and the expectations of my family that I couldn’t sleep. It seemed that if I studied for one more minute, I could get one more point than others, and if I listened to one more class, I could get one more question right.

It’s worth staying up late and becoming a caveman to get into your dream school.

I looked at the moon twice in the middle of the night, but more often I was looking at the teacher on the screen and the notes in the book, and I didn't even think about looking at the moon. I once thought about giving up in the middle of the night, but I was unwilling to end it after giving so much. I also cried under the quilt in the dead of night, but most of the time, even crying was a luxury, and I might as well go to bed early.

With half a month approaching the postgraduate entrance examination, I decided to go to bed early, have a good rest, and take the exam with full energy. The funny thing is that I am used to sleeping in the middle of the night, and it is a bit difficult to fall asleep before 12 o'clock.

3. I can’t afford any of the jewelry in the live broadcast room

Jewelry Sales Wang Qinqin

I am a jewellery clerk, but I cannot afford any of the jewellery in other people’s live broadcast rooms. My mobile phone is the reason why I am depressed late at night, but it is also an outlet to soothe my emotions.

I am used to watching live broadcasts at night, including food broadcasts, talent shows, and live broadcasts. Late one night, I accidentally saw a jewelry live broadcast. Because it was related to work, I watched it for a while. Who knew that this "short time" would end the live broadcast. I also paid special attention to how many people were watching the jewelry live broadcast in the middle of the night. The audience in the live broadcast room came and went, and the number of online people remained at around 2,000.

The anchor showed a big diamond ring in front of the camera, and asked the audience with an impassioned smile, "Is it sparkling? Is it bright?" She also emphasized that her diamonds strictly comply with the country's 4C standards (Editor's note: referring to the diamond's carat weight, clarity, color, and cut), and the assistant showed the certificate at the back.

After the anchor shouted "321, link up", I realized what was happening and clicked into the small yellow cart. The cheap ones cost a few thousand yuan, and the expensive ones cost hundreds of thousands of yuan. I was a little skeptical. Is there really anyone who buys things worth hundreds of thousands of yuan online? But when I saw people selling hundreds of diamonds in one night, my only thought was to blame myself for not having enough money.

I look after jewelry worth tens of millions of yuan at the counter every day, but I only earn a few thousand yuan a month, and I can't even afford the cheapest pair of earrings at the counter. If I buy them, it means I can't pay the rent, take the subway, or eat this month.

The live broadcast ended at around 2 a.m. I couldn't sleep anymore, so I picked up my phone and talked to my friends who were also awake about how hard it was to make a living in this strange city. I had no place to live, no entertainment, and I worked hard every day, but I couldn't save a few taels of silver in a year.

The most common complaint we had was that we would just quit our jobs and go back to our hometowns, find a job and not have to worry about food and drink. But in our 20s, we were not willing to just lie down and put down our phones. We still accepted reality and went to work on time the next day.

I say I’ll quit every day, but I get full attendance every month - that’s me.

4. The happiness level at night is 200% of that during the day

Mom Zheng Mingyue

I don’t want to stay up late, but the time before going to bed always gives me a long-lost sense of belonging.

If the child can get a relatively complete sleep at night, I will have some free time. I can eat the junk food that I have avoided for a long time, and I can watch the movies and TV series that I missed because of taking care of him, but I have to wait until the child falls asleep.

In the dead of night, when no one is disturbing you, you can open some snacks, put on your headphones, pick up your phone, put on your favorite TV series, and curl up on the sofa. That is the best time to enjoy life - quiet, free, and without having to coax children. Doing what you like at this time makes you 200% happier than during the day.

My health is not very good. Since I found out I was going to have a baby, I quit my job and stayed at home to take care of myself: taking medicine, getting checkups, avoiding certain foods, and being very careful in everything I do.

From the moment he was born, I changed from Zheng Mingyue to a "baby mom". Many days at one or two in the morning, I forced myself to nurse my baby to sleep, but even when I closed my eyes, I could hear him crying in my dreams. I couldn't eat or sleep well, and when I finally fell asleep, I woke up every two or three hours. I was really tired of this kind of life.

My wife tried to help me share the burden, such as patting the child when he was restless, handing me a glass of water when I woke up, and covering him with a blanket after putting him down. But these could not fundamentally solve the problem. Not only did they not allow me to sleep a minute longer, but they made me waste energy and talk a lot.

I just turned 30, and deep down I also have a little girl in my heart, innocent, unrestrained, and free. Without the shackles of responsibility called motherhood, I also want to go out and be myself for a moment.

In addition to playing with my phone at night, as a former art student, I was able to take on two part-time design jobs after my family went to sleep at night so that I would not be without income during the entire breastfeeding period.

My cell phone at night became a temporary harbor for me to dock, allowing me to briefly enter my own little world, where I was just Zheng Mingyue, without any other titles.

5. Learning to shop online at the age of nearly 80, placing orders passionately late at night

Retired old man Li Hongxiang

Who says the Internet has abandoned the elderly? I am almost 80 years old this year, and I have not only kept up with the Internet age, but also the age of staying up late.

In the past, I always said that my kids would not sleep at night and would just play with their phones. Now, I am like what you young people call "really good at watching". I can't stop watching videos, and I will hold my phone for 3 hours in the middle of the night just to pick out a favorite rice cooker.

Most of the things that young people can do with their mobile phones now, I can also do it: send messages and pictures on WeChat, like Moments, and grab red envelopes; watch videos and buy things on Douyin; I am even more proficient in using health codes and travel codes.

It was my grandson who taught me how to use a smartphone. Sometimes he would complain that I learned too slowly and that I always couldn’t understand or remember things, but he would still patiently continue to teach me, and I slowly mastered so many skills.

The thing I bought online that left the deepest impression on me was a thermal box that is still on my table and has only been used once. At that time, I had just learned how to buy things and was addicted to watching videos. One day, it was past 12 o'clock in the evening and I was about to go to bed when I saw a sales video saying how good this box was, "If you put the prepared food in it in the morning, it will still be hot in the afternoon."

I was moved and placed an order and paid for it right away. Two days later, the courier arrived and I opened the package and found it was just an ordinary plastic box, but I still had a glimmer of hope that maybe the plastic was of a special material.

It turned out to be just an ordinary box. When my family asked about the new box on the table, I responded by saying that I just bought it to store things, and I didn't dare to say that it was a "cooling box" that I spent more than 200 yuan on.

But this failure did not stop me from placing orders passionately late at night. I bought a lot of things one after another, all of which were expensive and impractical.

I am old, and it is really difficult to learn to use a mobile phone. I can't see the small words on the screen clearly, so I can only enlarge the font size. My fingers are not so flexible, but fortunately I have some knowledge and can write by hand. I can't tell whether the things online are real or fake. If I buy fakes, I won't get a refund and I dare not tell my family.

The elderly who say they don't want to use the Internet do so partly because they find it troublesome and partly because they are willing but unable to do so. However, the Internet will not cater to anyone, so we can either escape or face it.

Author: Feng Wen

Source: Xuebao Finance (ID: xuebaocaijingshe), faster, deeper and wiser