In 2024, Meta (formerly Facebook Inc) generated over 160 billion U.S. dollars in ad revenues. Advertising accounts for the vast majority of the social network's revenue. Facebook advertising revenue – additional information Facebook’s business model heavily relies on ads, as the majority of social network’s revenue comes from advertising. In 2020, about 97.9 percent of Facebook's global revenue was generated from advertising, whereas only around two percent was generated by payments and other fees revenue. Facebook ad revenue stood at close to 86 billion U.S. dollars in 2020, a new record for the company and a significant increase in comparison to the previous years. For instance, the social network generated almost seven billion U.S. dollars in ad revenue in 2013, about 10 billion less than the 2015 figure. Facebook's average revenue per user also significantly increased in the same time span, going from 6.81 U.S. dollars in 2013 to 32.03 U.S. dollars in 2020. The U.S. and Canada are important markets for Facebook, considering the average revenue per user (ARPU) in these two countries is far above the global average. Facebook’s ARPU in the U.S. and Canada was 41.41 U.S. dollars in the last quarter of 2019, while the global average was 8.52 U.S. dollars. In Europe, Facebook’s average revenue per user was 13.21 U.S. dollars during the same time period. In terms of segments, mobile is the most promising advertising form for the company. In 2018, Facebook’s mobile advertising revenue already accounted for 92 percent of the social network’s total advertising revenue. Facebook’s mobile advertising revenue grew from an estimate of 13 billion U.S. dollars in 2015 to 50.6 billion U.S. dollars in 2018.

In 2023, Google's share of digital advertising revenues worldwide was projected to amount to 39 percent. Facebook followed with a projected digital ad revenue share of 18 percent, while Amazon came in third with an expected seven percent. The player from Asia with the highest share is TikTok, with three percent, followed by Baidu, JD.com, as well as Tencent, all three with two percent.

In 2023, Meta Platforms earned over 131 billion U.S. dollars in digital revenue through online advertising. In 2022, search market leader Google generated 224.47 billion U.S. dollars through digital advertising channels.

In 2023, Google's ad revenue amounted to 264.59 billion U.S. dollars. The company generates advertising revenue through its Google Ads platform, which enables advertisers to display ads, product listings and service offerings across Google’s extensive ad network (properties, partner sites, and apps) to web users. Google advertising Advertising accounts for the majority of Google’s revenue, which amounted to a total of 305.63 billion U.S. dollars in 2023. The majority of Google's advertising revenue comes from search advertising. Google market share These revenue figures come as no surprise, as Google accounts for the majority of the online and mobile search market worldwide. As of September 2023, Google was responsible for more than 84 percent of global desktop search traffic. The company holds a market share of more than 80 percent in a wide range of digital markets, having little to no domestic competition in many of them. China, Russia, and to a certain extent, Japan, are some of the few notable exceptions, where local products are more preferred.

In 2020, Google dominated the digital advertising market in Canada with a share of 50 percent, compared to Facebook's market share of 33 percent. Total digital ad spend in Canada stood at over 9.6 billion Canadian dollars that year.

In 2023, Google accounted for an estimated 26.8 percent of the total digital advertising revenue generated in the United States and was the largest digital ad publisher in the country. Facebook and Amazon followed, with 21.1 and 12.5 percent, respectively.

In the fourth quarter of 2024, Meta's net income amounted to 20.8 billion U.S. dollars, up from 15.7 billion when compared to the previous quarter.Facebook company informationFacebook is the biggest social network worldwide. The platform generates the vast majority of its revenues through advertising – as of March 2020, 98 percent of Facebook’s revenues were derived from ad sales, making the company highly dependent on market regulations regarding digital ad sales. In 2019, Facebook was second only to Google in terms of digital advertising revenues. The company’s ad revenue during this period amounted to 69.7 billion U.S. dollars. Facebook is still among the fastest-growing tech companies in the world. In 2020, the company increased its revenue by 21.6 percent compared to the previous year. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg also ranks among the richest internet billionaires with a personal net worth of roughly 97 billion U.S. dollars.

In 2024, Meta Platforms generated a revenue of over 164 billion U.S. dollars, up from 134 billion USD in 2023. The majority of Meta’s profits come from its advertising revenue.Meta’s total Family of Apps revenue for 2022 amounted to 114 billion U.S. dollars. Additionally, Meta’s Reality Labs, the company’s VR division, generated around 2.1 billion dollars. Meta’s marketing expenditure for 2022 amounted to just over 15 billion U.S. dollars, up from 14 billion U.S. dollars in the previous year. Increasing audience base despite privacy misgivings Meta’s user numbers have continued to grow steadily throughout past years. In the fourth quarter of 2022, there was a total of 3.74 billion worldwide users across all of Meta’s platforms. For this same time frame, the company recorded 407 million monthly active users across Europe. Downloads of Meta’s app Oculus, for which virtual reality headsets are required, increased greatly from 2020 to 2021, reaching a total of 10.62 million downloads by the end of last year. Up until 2021, downloads had grown in a steady manner but from 2020 to 2021, they more than doubled.User numbers have increased despite data security issues and past controversy such as the Cambridge Analytica scandal in 2018. There remains skepticism surrounding the idea of the metaverse in which Meta aims to immerse itself. Of surveyed adults in the United States, the majority said that they were concerned about their privacy if Meta were to succeed in creating the metaverse.

In 2024, Meta's average revenue per user was 49.63 U.S. dollars, up from 44.60 USD in 2023. The social network's family of apps segment revenue (which mainly consists of advertising) in 2024 was over 162 billion U.S. dollars.

According to the source, Alphabet alone accounted for an estimated one-quarter of the global advertising spending in 2023, making the Google-controlling holding the world's leading media owner by that criterion. Meta and Amazon followed with shares of 13.5 and 4.7 percent, respectively. Along with Alibaba and TikTok, the five companies collectively accounted for over half of the global ad expenditure that year. The same source projected that social media, connected TV (CTV), and retail media will be the leading media by forecast ad revenues growth rate in 2024.

Alphabet: the omnipresent ad player Google's global ad revenues will surpass an estimated 273 billion U.S. dollars in 2024 – over twice as much as recorded half a decade earlier, in 2019, before the pandemic. The annual value was forecast to continue to expand, exceeding 340 billion dollars by 2027. The seemingly unstoppable growth relies on the search leviathan's nearly ubiquitous presence: As of April 2024, its browser Google Chrome, for instance, concentrated over three-quarters of the market share in very populated countries such as India and Brazil. In the U.S., it accounted for over half of the browser segment, whereas the global average almost reached two-thirds.

Meta: the social media ad champion Thanks to the popularity of platforms like Facebook and Instagram, Meta still dominates the social media segment from an advertising perspective. Between early 2021 and late 2023, Meta's global in-app ad impressions quarterly growth rates consistently remained double-digit, increasing by over 20 percent in the final quarter of the latter year. As of April 2024, it controlled two of the top three social networks by number of active users worldwide: Facebook with more than three million at number one and third-placed Instagram with about two billion. YouTube, controlled by Alphabet, ranked second with over 2.5 billion active users.

As of 2023, Google generated nearly 238 billion U.S. dollars in advertising revenue, far ahead of other media companies. Meanwhile, Meta, formerly Facebook, recorded an advertising revenue of approximately 132 billion dollars.

Over the past decade, the revenue share of Danish internet advertising abroad was higher than the share of revenue of advertising abroad in total. As of 2020, 64 percent of the revenue of internet advertisements went to the foreign companies Google, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

In the most recently reported fiscal year, Google's revenue amounted to 348.16 billion U.S. dollars. Google's revenue is largely made up by advertising revenue, which amounted to 264.59 billion U.S. dollars in 2024. As of October 2024, parent company Alphabet ranked first among worldwide internet companies, with a market capitalization of 2,02 billion U.S. dollars. Google’s revenue Founded in 1998, Google is a multinational internet service corporation headquartered in California, United States. Initially conceptualized as a web search engine based on a PageRank algorithm, Google now offers a multitude of desktop, mobile and online products. Google Search remains the company’s core web-based product along with advertising services, communication and publishing tools, development and statistical tools as well as map-related products. Google is also the producer of the mobile operating system Android, Chrome OS, Google TV as well as desktop and mobile applications such as the internet browser Google Chrome or mobile web applications based on pre-existing Google products. Recently, Google has also been developing selected pieces of hardware which ranges from the Nexus series of mobile devices to smart home devices and driverless cars. Due to its immense scale, Google also offers a crisis response service covering disasters, turmoil and emergencies, as well as an open source missing person finder in times of disaster. Despite the vast scope of Google products, the company still collects the majority of its revenue through online advertising on Google Site and Google network websites. Other revenues are generated via product licensing and most recently, digital content and mobile apps via the Google Play Store, a distribution platform for digital content. As of September 2020, some of the highest-grossing Android apps worldwide included mobile games such as Candy Crush Saga, Pokemon Go, and Coin Master.

The revenues of Danish advertisements abroad increased annually from 2009 to 2019. In 2019, the highest amount went to Google, at over 3.9 billion Danish kroner, followed by Facebook, with a revenue of about 1.2 billion kroner.

In Norway, online advertising expenditure amounted to about 12.66 billion Norwegian kroner in 2022. Well over three quarters of this value was spent on Google and Facebook. Digital newspaper advertising spending was roughly 2.69 billion kroner that year. All in all, online ad revenue steadily increased in the presented period.

Digital advertising spending in Asia has grown rapidly in recent years, amounting to an estimated 257 billion U.S. dollars in 2024. A significant increase from around 125 billion dollars in 2019, digital ad spend in Asia was projected to continue its upward trajectory, set to reach an estimated 332 billion dollars by 2028. Digital advertising on the rise Many countries and territories in the Asia-Pacific region, particularly in East and Southeast Asia, already have high internet penetration rates of 70 percent and over. During the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers have increasingly turned to online channels for new product discovery and for purchasing said products. Advertisers in APAC have been capitalizing on this ongoing development for more than a decade, as ad spending for internet surpassed television ad spend in 2015, thus becoming the marketing medium with the highest advertising expenditure in the region. Wasted ad spend One of the leading risks for advertisers and advertising networks is ad fraud, leading to billions of dollars of wasted ad spend per year. Ad fraud generally refers to fraudulent activity in which scammers inflate ad engagement by using low-paid workers or bots, drawing financial gain from networks paying them based on ad impressions or clicks.Tech giants Facebook and Google are among the platforms the highest ad spend is wasted on in APAC. The prevalence of advertising and bot fraud differs vastly across the region, being below one percent in some countries and territories and over ten percent in the countries most affected.

In January 2025, the United Kingdom had more than 55.9 million Facebook users. Four years before, in September 2020, the number of Facebook users in the UK stood at 45.85, showing a 21.9 percent growth in audience size in four years. Facebook remains the leading social network Despite a recent history of controversies and user privacy breaches - not least of which being the Cambridge Analytica scandal of 2018 - Facebook has managed to remain the top social network in the UK. As of July 2024, the platform had a 62.8 percent market share, almost six times over that of X, formerly known as Twitter. Besides being the most popular social network across all age groups, Facebook and its subsidiary WhatsApp report the highest use among those aged between 26 and 35 years old. Role in political advertising Facebook has also proved to be a lucrative advertising platform, having generated 22.7 percent of online ad revenue in the UK in 2018. This was forecast to increase to 28 percent in 2021, placing the social network second to Google within the online advertising sector. Unsurprisingly, political groups aiming to capitalize on this reach have taken to large-scale advertising on Facebook. In 2019, 3.31 million euros was spent on targeted political advertising in the UK alone, the second-highest reported figure in Europe.  

Android maintained its position as the leading mobile operating system worldwide in the fourth quarter of 2024 with a market share of about 72.04 percent. Android's closest rival, Apple's iOS, had a market share of approximately 27.49 percent during the same period. The leading mobile operating systems Both unveiled in 2007, Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS have evolved through incremental updates introducing new features and capabilities. The latest version of iOS, iOS 18, was released in September 2024, while the most recent Android iteration, Android 15, was made available in September 2023. A key difference between the two systems concerns hardware - iOS is only available on Apple devices, whereas Android ships with devices from a range of manufacturers such as Samsung, Google and OnePlus. In addition, Apple has had far greater success in bringing its users up to date. As of February 2024, 66 percent of iOS users had iOS 17 installed, while in the same month only 13 percent of Android users ran the latest version. The rise of the smartphone From around 2010, the touchscreen smartphone revolution had a major impact on sales of basic feature phones, as the sales of smartphones increased from 139 million units in 2008 to 1.39 billion units in 2023. In 2020, smartphone sales decreased to 1.38 billion units due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Apple, Samsung, and lately also Xiaomi, were the big winners in this shift towards smartphones, with BlackBerry and Nokia among those unable to capitalize.

In terms of revenue generated per month between 2019 and May 2021 by Facebook messenger, the highest amount was reached in January 2019, with about 12.4 thousand U.S. dollars. According to Airnowdata, Facebook messenger had reached a second peak In February 2021 reaching about 11.6 thousand U.S. dollars.

With roughly three billion monthly active users as of the second quarter of 2023, Facebook is the most used online social network worldwide. The platform surpassed two billion active users in the second quarter of 2017, taking just over 13 years to reach this milestone. In comparison, Meta-owned Instagram took 11.2 years, and Google’s YouTube took just over 14 years to achieve this landmark. As of January 2022, Facebook’s leading audience base was in India, with almost 330 million users whilst the United States ranked second with an approximate total of 179 million users. The platform also finds remarkable popularity in Indonesia and Brazil. Social Media usage in the United States In January 2021, Facebook was the platform on which users in the United States spent the most time per day. The average time spent on Facebook was 33 minutes, followed by TikTok with 32 minutes and Twitter with 31 daily minutes. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020, all major social media platforms saw an increase in daily usage, which then either plateaued or decreased in 2021. At the end of 2021, over a quarter of all Facebook users in the United States belonged to the 25 to 34 year age group and 18.2 percent of users were in the 35 to 44 year age group. In general, Facebook users were more likely to be female. Meta Platforms Meta is Facebook’s recently renamed parent company and had a grand total of 3.59 billion core product users by the final quarter of 2021. Other Meta products include Instagram, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp and Oculus – Meta’s virtual reality subsidiary which produces VR headsets. In 2021, Meta's revenue amounted to 117 billion US dollars, up from around 86 billion U.S. dollars in the previous financial year.