Purpose Objective of this paper to evaluate mobile services on a limited set of characteristics, e.g. usage context, the Innovativeness of the service, efforts required of users for using the service, the usefulness of the service and the likelihood with which it will be used, in order to show that distinction between services is highly relevant for adoption and acceptance research. Design/method/approach In this research the mobile services are object of study and therefore an exploratory approach making use of Q-sort methodology is used. Findings The characteristics of the 48 services under study play an important role when judged on the five dimensions. Advanced services, explicitly exploiting the mobile nature of the services like navigation and localization, embedded in all kind of task and process related activities, stood out as the most innovative services, however these are the least likely to be used because they are expected to fit day-to-day routines and usage context the least. Easy to use services and services that fit most contexts are most likely to be used. Practical implications Designers of mobile services and applications have to be aware of the subtle interplay between usage context, the service or application to be designed, the ease of use. Only when all these factors are taken into account the services may have value to users. Original value This is one of the very few studies focused on mobile services, instead of user perception and behavior. In most research on mobile service adoption and acceptance the characteristics of services are threatened as a black box. This paper shows how relevant it is to look into characteristics of mobile services themselves.@en