More than three-quarters (76 per cent) of 0- to 5-year-olds use digital devices at home, new figures from the Department for Education show.

The statistics reveal that family income and the level of deprivation in an area make no difference to how likely it is, overall, for children aged 0-5 to use devices such as tablets or smartphones.

When asked about why children used them, the most common reason given by 74 per cent of parents was to support learning. Other reasons included to encourage play and creativity (mentioned by 45 per cent of parents) and to keep the children occupied or quiet (cited by 44 per cent of parents).

The survey also found that children in lower-income households were more than twice as likely to use the device for learning on a daily basis than those in richer households, with 32 per cent of children in households earning less than £10,000 using electronic devices every day to help their children learn, compared with 15 per cent of children in households earning £45,000 or more.

When asked about the types of learning that digital devices were used for, the survey found that 68 per cent of children in households earning less than £10,000 a year used the devices to help children learn songs, poems, nursery rhymes or to tell them stories. That compares with 62 per cent of children in families earning £45,000 or more a year.

It also found that, overall, 65 per cent of children were helped to learn the alphabet, spell or recognise words using digital devices and 62 per cent of children were helped to learn to count. There was no difference between families on different income levels in how likely they were to carry out these types of learning.

Children were most likely to use a tablet computer (64 per cent), followed in popularity by the smartphone (40 per cent), laptop (16 per cent) and games console (15 per cent).

The statistics are based on a survey of 5,922 parents in England.

Education secretary Damian Hinds said: “This survey underlines that technology is a double edged sword. We all know that phones and devices are an easy distraction for both children and their parents, me included.

“But also when used in the right way, technology can actively support a child’s learning and is something we must harness in our mission to support parents with children’s learning at home. 

“We want to improve children’s early communication skills, so they begin school able to thrive, and it’s encouraging the majority of parents - 74 per cent - are helping their children to learn through the use of digital devices.

“We want to improve access to high quality apps for parents to support this learning, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, to make sure families don’t miss out.”