How many people use social media?

              Social media usage is one of the most popular online activities. In 2024, over five billion people were using social media worldwide, a number projected to increase to over six billion in 2028.

              Who uses social media?
              Social networking is one of the most popular digital activities worldwide and it is no surprise that social networking penetration across all regions is constantly increasing. As of January 2023, the global social media usage rate stood at 59 percent. This figure is anticipated to grow as lesser developed digital markets catch up with other regions
              when it comes to infrastructure development and the availability of cheap mobile devices. In fact, most of social media’s global growth is driven by the increasing usage of mobile devices. Mobile-first market Eastern Asia topped the global ranking of mobile social networking penetration, followed by established digital powerhouses such as the Americas and Northern Europe.

              How much time do people spend on social media?
              Social media is an integral part of daily internet usage. On average, internet users spend 151 minutes per day on social media and messaging apps, an increase of 40 minutes since 2015. On average, internet users in Latin America had the highest average time spent per day on social media.

              What are the most popular social media platforms?
              Market leader Facebook was the first social network to surpass one billion registered accounts and currently boasts approximately 2.9 billion monthly active users, making it the most popular social network worldwide. In June 2023, the top social media apps in the Apple App Store included mobile messaging apps WhatsApp and Telegram Messenger, as well as the ever-popular app version of Facebook.

Introduction

Video Marketing Statistics: Video marketing has emerged as a cornerstone of digital strategies, leveraging the power of visual content to engage audiences and drive business growth. As video consumption continues to rise, companies across various industries increasingly adopt video as a critical component of their marketing efforts. The statistics surrounding video marketing reflect its growing influence, with metrics highlighting the effectiveness of different video formats, audience preferences, and the impact on consumer behavior.

From how-to guides to thought leadership pieces, video marketing is an essential tool for brands looking to connect more dynamically and impactfully with their target audiences.

How much time do people spend on social media? As of 2025, the average daily social media usage of internet users worldwide amounted to 141 minutes per day, down from 143 minutes in the previous year. Currently, the country with the most time spent on social media per day is Brazil, with online users spending an average of 3 hours and 49 minutes on social media each day. In comparison, the daily time spent with social media in the U.S. was just 2 hours and 16 minutes. Global social media usageCurrently, the global social network penetration rate is 62.3 percent. Northern Europe had an 81.7 percent social media penetration rate, topping the ranking of global social media usage by region. Eastern and Middle Africa closed the ranking with 10.1 and 9.6 percent usage reach, respectively. People access social media for a variety of reasons. Users like to find funny or entertaining content and enjoy sharing photos and videos with friends, but mainly use social media to stay in touch with current events friends. Global impact of social mediaSocial media has a wide-reaching and significant impact on not only online activities but also offline behavior and life in general. During a global online user survey in February 2019, a significant share of respondents stated that social media had increased their access to information, ease of communication, and freedom of expression. On the flip side, respondents also felt that social media had worsened their personal privacy, increased a polarization in politics and heightened everyday distractions.

During a 2025 survey, ** percent of respondents from Nigeria stated that they used social media as a source of news. In comparison, just ** percent of Japanese respondents said the same. Large portions of social media users around the world admit that they do not trust social platforms either as media sources or as a way to get news, and yet they continue to access such networks on a daily basis. Social media: trust and consumption Despite the majority of adults surveyed in each country reporting that they used social networks to keep up to date with news and current affairs, a 2018 study showed that social media is the least trusted news source in the world. Less than ** percent of adults in Europe considered social networks to be trustworthy in this respect, yet more than ** percent of adults in Portugal, Poland, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Croatia said that they got their news on social media. What is clear is that we live in an era where social media is such an enormous part of daily life that consumers will still use it in spite of their doubts or reservations. Concerns about fake news and propaganda on social media have not stopped billions of users accessing their favorite networks on a daily basis. Most Millennials in the United States use social media for news every day, and younger consumers in European countries are much more likely to use social networks for national political news than their older peers. Like it or not, reading news on social is fast becoming the norm for younger generations, and this form of news consumption will likely increase further regardless of whether consumers fully trust their chosen network or not.

As of February 2025, 5.56 billion individuals worldwide were internet users, which amounted to 67.9 percent of the global population. Of this total, 5.24 billion, or 63.9 percent of the world's population, were social media users. Global internet usage Connecting billions of people worldwide, the internet is a core pillar of the modern information society. Northern Europe ranked first among worldwide regions by the share of the population using the internet in 20254. In The Netherlands, Norway and Saudi Arabia, 99 percent of the population used the internet as of February 2025. North Korea was at the opposite end of the spectrum, with virtually no internet usage penetration among the general population, ranking last worldwide. Eastern Asia was home to the largest number of online users worldwide – over 1.34 billion at the latest count. Southern Asia ranked second, with around 1.2 billion internet users. China, India, and the United States rank ahead of other countries worldwide by the number of internet users. Worldwide internet user demographics As of 2024, the share of female internet users worldwide was 65 percent, five percent less than that of men. Gender disparity in internet usage was bigger in African countries, with around a ten percent difference. Worldwide regions, like the Commonwealth of Independent States and Europe, showed a smaller usage gap between these two genders. As of 2024, global internet usage was higher among individuals between 15 and 24 years old across all regions, with young people in Europe representing the most significant usage penetration, 98 percent. In comparison, the worldwide average for the age group 15–24 years was 79 percent. The income level of the countries was also an essential factor for internet access, as 93 percent of the population of the countries with high income reportedly used the internet, as opposed to only 27 percent of the low-income markets.

Pre-test analysis Y variable (excessive digital media consumption) results using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 for research title "Doomscrolling and Information Overload on Generation Z: Examining the Link Between Excessive Digital Media Consumption and Stress Level".

During a January 2024 global survey among marketers, nearly 60 percent reported plans to increase their organic use of YouTube for marketing purposes in the following 12 months. LinkedIn and Instagram followed, respectively mentioned by 57 and 56 percent of the respondents intending to use them more. According to the same survey, Facebook was the most important social media platform for marketers worldwide.

Pre-test analysis X2 variable (information overload) results using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 for research title "Doomscrolling and Information Overload on Generation Z: Examining the Link Between Excessive Digital Media Consumption and Stress Level".

The 2024 Social Survey. Digital consumption. Habits of the Andalusian population provides information on digital consumption, from the typology of the products and services consumed, the characteristics and motivations of purchases or payments made online or digital consumption as a generator of income. It also focuses on the relationship of the population with the electronic administration of the Junta de Andalucía. The fieldwork was carried out between February and April 2024 through the realization of more than 5,000 telephone and online surveys to people residing in Andalusia.

In 2024, Google ranked as the most valuable media and entertainment brand worldwide, with a brand value of 683 billion U.S. dollars. Facebook ranked second, valued at around 167 billion dollars. Part of the Tencent Group, WeChat and v.qq.com (Tencent Video) had a brand value of 56 billion and 17.5 billion dollars, respectively.

The global social media penetration rate in was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2028 by in total 11.6 (+18.19 percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the penetration rate is estimated to reach 75.31 and therefore a new peak in 2028. Notably, the social media penetration rate of was continuously increasing over the past years.

Pre-test analysis X1 variable (doomscrolling) results using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 for research title "Doomscrolling and Information Overload on Generation Z: Examining the Link Between Excessive Digital Media Consumption and Stress Level".

Pre-test analysis X2 variable (information overload) results using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 for research title "Doomscrolling and Information Overload on Generation Z: Examining the Link Between Excessive Digital Media Consumption and Stress Level".

During a 2024 survey among marketers worldwide, approximately 83 percent selected increased exposure as a benefit of social media marketing. Increased traffic followed, mentioned by 73 percent of the respondents, while 65 percent cited generated leads.

              The multibillion-dollar social media ad industry

              Between 2019 – the last year before the pandemic – and 2024, global social media advertising spending skyrocketed by 140 percent, surpassing an estimated 230 billion U.S. dollars in the latter year. That figure was forecast to increase by nearly 50 percent by the end of the decade, exceeding 345 billion dollars in 2029. As of 2024, the social media networks with the most monthly active users were Facebook, with over three billion, and YouTube, with more than 2.5 billion.

              Pros and cons of GenAI for social media marketing

              According to another 2024 survey, generative artificial intelligence's (GenAI) leading benefits for social media marketing according to professionals worldwide included increased efficiency and easier idea generation. The third place was a tie between increased content production and enhanced creativity. All those advantages were cited by between 33 and 38 percent of the interviewees. As for GenAI's top challenges for global social media marketing,
              maintaining authenticity and the value of human creativity ranked first, mentioned by 43 and 40 percent of the respondents, respectively. Another 35 percent deemed ensuring the content resonates as an obstacle.

Supplementary files for article "Beyond social media: The influence of news consumption, populism, and expert trust on belief in COVID-19 misinformation"The COVID-19 pandemic was accompanied by an unprecedented influx of misinformation often with adverse impact on the effectiveness of institutional responses to the health crisis. However, relatively little is still known about the factors that may have facilitated the proliferation and public acceptance of misinformation related to the virus or to the government’s anti-pandemic measures, particularly in comparative perspective. Utilizing data collected by a representative cross-country survey (N = 5,000) in four countries led by populist leaders during the pandemic—Brazil, Poland, Serbia, and the United States—this study explores the links between three mutually interrelated factors, namely media usage across different platforms, affinity to populism, and trust in scientific expertise, and people’s beliefs in selected COVID-related misinformation. The findings show that preexisting attitudes, especially affinity to populism and mistrust in experts, are generally stronger predictors of people’s likelihood to endorse misinformation related to the pandemic than their news consumption patterns. Nevertheless, the analysis also indicates an important role played by exposure to specific media brands, particularly those promoting a skeptical stance toward preventive measures and COVID-19 vaccines, as well as messaging apps, which display stronger relationship with misinformation beliefs than social networking sites. The article concludes by discussing implications for practical efforts to combat misinformation, especially during a health crisis.©The Author(s), CC BY 4.0

Supplemental information files for article News consumption and immigration attitudes: a mixed methods approach

Existing research has shown that the media can influence public attitudes to immigration. While existing research provides insight into both quantitative and qualitative patterns of media coverage of immigration, research that links such coverage with audience attitudes is almost exclusively quantitative, often focused on the west, and are often single-country studies. We argue that the adoption of a mixed-methods approach to audiences of immigration news, combined with a comparative design and a focus on Eastern Europe – a region scoring lowest in the world in terms of migrant acceptance – can bring significant advances to knowledge in this area, leading to a more rounded understanding of how media come to shape immigration attitudes. To demonstrate this, we draw on a comparative, mixed-methods data set comprising representative population surveys (N=4,092), an expert survey (N=60), and qualitative interviews (N=120) conducted in four Eastern European countries. In contrast to existing research on Western Europe, we found significant variation in the links between attitudes to immigration and use of Public Service Media (PSM), with PSM consumption linked with more negative attitudes to immigration in some countries, and with more positive attitudes in others. Second, our results confirm that different attitudes to immigration are embedded in different qualitative understandings of immigration: while participants with more positive attitudes often adopted a more inclusive understanding of immigration, those with more negative attitudes adopted a narrower understanding. Third, we demonstrated the importance of family and acquaintances as trusted sources of information.

Regression linear (patch coefficient independent variable and dependent variable to antecedent variable) as part of path analysis using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 for research title "Doomscrolling and Information Overload on Generation Z: Examining the Link Between Excessive Digital Media Consumption and Stress Level".

The Chinese ebook database market presents a significant opportunity, exhibiting robust growth. While the exact CAGR isn't provided, considering the global growth in digital content and the substantial Chinese market, a conservative estimate of the Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) for the period 2025-2033 would be around 15%. This projection factors in increased internet penetration, rising smartphone usage, government initiatives promoting digital literacy, and the increasing demand for accessible educational and research resources. With a 2025 market size of $502.3 million, this CAGR suggests a substantial market expansion by 2033. Key drivers include the rising popularity of e-readers and tablets, the increasing adoption of online learning platforms, and the growing need for efficient information retrieval in academic and research settings. The market is segmented by application (university, research institute, public library) and type (arts, business, engineering, medicine, sciences), reflecting the diverse needs of various user groups. Leading companies like CEPIEC, Beijing Zhongke, and China National Sci-Tech Information are capitalizing on these trends, though competition is intensifying as new players enter the market. Growth will likely be influenced by factors such as government regulations regarding digital content, technological advancements, and the ongoing evolution of user preferences. The segmentation of the Chinese ebook database market allows for a nuanced understanding of market dynamics. The academic and research segments are expected to drive substantial growth, fueled by the expanding higher education sector and the increasing reliance on digital resources for research. The public library segment also presents a promising avenue for growth, with ongoing digitization efforts and increasing accessibility initiatives. The diverse subject categories within the "type" segmentation (arts, business, engineering, etc.) highlight the breadth of content available and the specific demands of various user groups. Market restraints might include concerns about copyright infringement, the need for improved digital infrastructure in certain regions, and potential challenges in managing the vast amount of digital content effectively. However, the overall market outlook remains positive, driven by the fundamental shift towards digital information consumption in China and the inherent advantages of ebook databases over traditional print materials.

This study examines the direct and indirect effects of doomscrolling and information overload on excessive digital media consumption and stress levels. Using quantitative design with inferential and path analysis, data were collected via purposive online sampling through Instagram, TikTok, X/Twitter, and YouTube, resulting in 722 valid responses.

During a 2024 survey among marketers worldwide, around 86 percent reported using Facebook for marketing purposes. Instagram and LinkedIn followed, respectively mentioned by 79 and 65 percent of the respondents.

              The global social media marketing segment

              According to the same study, 59 percent of responding marketers intended to increase their organic use of YouTube for marketing purposes throughout that year. LinkedIn and Instagram followed with similar shares, rounding up the top three social media platforms attracting a planned growth in organic use among global marketers in 2024. Their main driver is increasing brand exposure and traffic, which led the ranking of benefits of social media marketing worldwide.

              Social media for B2B marketing

              Social media platform adoption rates among business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) marketers vary according to each subsegment's focus. While B2C professionals prioritize Facebook and Instagram – both run by Meta, Inc. – due to their popularity among online audiences, B2B marketers concentrate their endeavors on Microsoft-owned LinkedIn due to its goal to connect people and companies in a corporate context.