Are more Chinese netizens using chat apps and VoIP than speaking on their mobile phones? The latest financial results from China Mobile appear to show traditional phone calls are not keeping pace with modernity.

Chinese telecom operator China Mobile published its annual performance for 2015, stating that the company achieved operating revenue of CNY668.3 billion in 2015, a year-on-year increase of 2.6%; and its profit attributable to shareholders was CNY108.5 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 0.6%.

China Mobile's communications service revenue was CNY584.1 billion, a decrease of 1.3% year-on-year. At the same time, the company's data business income exceeded voice service income for the first time, accounting for 52% of the total communications service revenue.

During the year, the company's mobile data traffic increased by 143.7% year-on-year; the data usage per user of its mobile Internet users increased by 118.5% year-on-year; and its mobile Internet revenue increased by 30.5% year-on-year to CNY200.9 billion. Mobile apps are a main driver for this surge.

While publishing its annual performance, China Mobile also released its operating statistics for February 2016. The report showed that China Mobile added 24.8 million new 4G users in February, reaching a total of 360.4 million; and it realized a net increase of 2.7 million mobile users, reaching a total of 831.3 million.

However, with the large increase of 4G users, the number of its 3G users continued to decrease. During February, the company lost 5.863 million 3G users to a total of 157.132 million.

In addition, China Mobile published its broadband user group stats for the first time. In January and February 2016, China Mobile achieved net increases of 1.496 million and 1.406 million cable broadband users, respectively; and the total number of its cable broadband users reached 57.931 million.