Despite a tumultuous 2018, Facebook is still the top social network in the United States, with 169.76 million mobile users accessing the Facebook app in September 2019. The company’s other properties Instagram and Facebook Messenger ranked second and third with 121 and 106 million users respectively. Cambridge Analytica scandal 2018 The biggest social media company in the world had a difficult 2018. The platform has long been accused of enabling the spread of fake news during the 2016 election and beyond. One of the first and biggest negative Facebook stories of 2018 was the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which unfolded from March 2018. The Guardian, The Observer, and The New York Times simultaneously reported on political data firm Cambridge Analytica harvesting data of millions of Facebook users worldwide without their knowledge before the 2016 election, which led to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg having to testify before Congress in April 2018. Facebook usage behavior changes Due to the revelations about Facebook and the company’s treatment of private user data, many U.S. users are planning to use the social network much less and to be much more careful about what they post . During an April 2018 survey, only 20 percent of respondents stated that their Facebook usage has not changed, and they were planning on continuing to use the social platform as much as they always had in the past.

During an September 2019 survey, it was found that 25 percent of teens in the United States used Instagram the most out of all social networks. This is hardly surprising, as U.S. teens rated Instagram among their favorite social network for the past few years. In spring 2019, 35 percent of teenagers ranked the photo-sharing app as their most important social network. Teens and social media in the United States As evidenced by exasperated parents and teachers everywhere, social media is one of the most popular online activities among teenagers in the United States. Despite the near-constant social media usage, teens are usually reasonably aware of the time they spent online. During an April 2018 survey, 54 and 41 percent of responding teens stated that they spent too much time on their cellphone and on social media respectively. Due to constant interaction with other people online, teens come across a wide range of personalities. The most common personality types that teens come across social media are oversharers (people who share too many personal details on social media) and ranters (people who rant and complain about things a lot). Social media and emotional well-being One of the key benefits of social media is that it can make teenagers feel less lonely and more confident and popular. However, with teens who have a low social-emotional well-being, social media can exacerbate pre-existing problems such as feeling left out or being excluded, as well as feeling bad about themselves when their posts did not get enough likes or comments. In the end, online socializing can make up for the lack of friends IRL (in real life) but it can also make things worse for teens who are already in emotional turmoil.

This statistic gives information on the most popular social networking apps in the United States as of September 2019, ranked by average number of monthly usage sessions. During the measured period, mobile Facebook users accessed the social networking platform an average of 159.55 times per month. Instagram users generated 68.80 usage session per month.

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.

In 2025, Facebook remained the most-used social platform for news in the United States, with ** percent of respondents reporting they accessed news on it. YouTube followed closely at ** percent, recording a slight increase from the previous year. X (formerly Twitter) saw the most notable growth, rising by ***** percent to ** percent.

This statistic gives information on the most popular social networking apps in the United States as of September 2019, ranked by monthly user engagement. During that month, mobile Facebook users spent an average of 769.16 minutes on the social networking platform.

Facebook remains the most popular social media in Latin America in 2025, with an audience of 448 million users. However, other platforms currently have a higher growth rate than Meta's flagship platform. The Byte-dance owned platform TikTok has become the third-largest platform in the region, with around 261.9 million users, only behind Instagram, which amasses around 276.4 million users.

This statistic depicts social media platforms most commonly used in order to buy from artists from 2018 to 2019. According to the source, ** percent of respondents stated that they used Instagram in order to buy from artists in 2019.

In 2025, Facebook remained the most popular social media network for news worldwide, with ** percent of respondents to a survey held in February that year saying that they had used the platform for news in the last week. On the other hand, TikTok news consumption is on the rise—in 2025, it was *** times higher than in 2020, when it stood at just *** percent.

This statistic ranks the most popular social platforms where professionals of the digital sector promoted their products and services through influencers in Spain in 2019. Most of the influencers hired by promoters to perform this task worked on the video and photo-sharing platform Instagram, with ** percent of digital professionals. Facebook followed far behind, accounting for ** percent of the responses.

A survey of global schools conducted in 2019 found that Facebook was the most popular social media platform for school marketing, with ** percent of surveyed educational institutions worldwide using the site for marketing purposes. Instagram, Twitter and YouTube were also popular channels, with over ** percent of schools reporting usage of these platforms over the last 12 months before the survey.

In 2019, Facebook was the most used social media brand in Australia which was used among approximately ** percent of respondents. This was followed by Instagram and Whataspp, which amounted to approximately ** percent and ***** percent of respondents, respectively.

This statistic presents the most useful social media platform for getting information about furniture, home accents or mattresses in the United States as of 2019. As of 2019, ** percent of respondents stated that they found Facebook to be the most valuable social media platform for acquiring information on furniture, home accents and mattresses in the United States.

From January to November 2019, the most popular everyday fashion brand in the United States on social media was Fashion Nova. The fast fashion brand had a total of ***** million actions taken and an audience of **** million users on social media. The second-most popular everyday fashion brand was Victoria's Secret, with ***** million social media actions taken, and an online audience of ***** million users.

This statistic presents the most used social platforms for searching for employment in Spain in 2019. LinkedIn was the favorite social network for this purpose during that year, followed by Facebook, at ** percent of respondents.

WhatsApp was the most popular mobile app in Russia as of July 2019, counting approximately ** million monthly users in the country. Russian social media network Vkontakte ranked fifth with an audience of over ** million, while Facebook did not make it into the top 10.

As of 2018, the majority of Norwegian internet users were on social media daily or almost daily, regardless of age. The largest share of daily social media users was between 25 and 34 years of age, amounting to 92 percent. All of the respondents in this age group used social media at least week once a week. Facebook was the most popular social media platform among both men and women in Norway in 2019: nearly 80 percent of men and just under 90 percent of women in the country reported to be Facebook users. The second social media app in the ranking was Snapchat, with over half of the men and over 70 percent of the women using it. Quitting social media?      Despite being very popular, Facebook was the network which the largest share of Norwegians had considered quitting , according to a survey conducted in the third quarter of 2019. In detail, over ten percent of the respondents did not want to use Facebook anymore. Three percent of Norwegian women considered quitting Instagram and Snapchat. One percent of men had thought of leaving Snapchat, as well.

 Social media worldwide      The worldwide figures were similar in the evaluated period. Facebook was the social media which was most commonly considered quitting, by nearly one third of the respondents globally. Instagram followed in the ranking, with 12 percent of people having considered quitting. Nine percent had considered quitting Snapchat in 2019.

A 2019 survey of online consumers in the United States revealed that 46 percent of respondents used Facebook as their primary social channel to find out about new products. Instagram was the second most-used social channel for finding new products, with 37 percent of U.S. online consumers browsing the image-sharing platform for shopping purposes. In contrast, only 11 percent of U.S. online consumers browsed Twitter to find out about new products.

From January to November 2019, the most popular direct-to-consumer brand on social media in the United States was Kylie Cosmetics. The cosmetics brand had 194 million actions taken and an audience of 26 million users on social media. The second-most popular brand was KKW Beauty, with 25.8 million social media actions taken, and an online user audience of 3.7 million.

Of the videos published in 2019 on the social media platform Facebook, the video titled "Illusionist Riana on Asia's Got Talent 2017" was ranked first with over 614 million views. The second most-viewed video released on Facebook in 2019 was "Get clever with your clutter...and these 7 organization hacks!" with 446 million views.