According to a survey conducted in South Korea in 2024, Instagram was one of the most popular social media platforms in South Korea, with around **** percent of survey respondents in that year stating that they used it the most frequently out of all the other social media services provided in the country. The former leader was Facebook, which, together with Instagram and WhatsApp belongs to Meta. Social media in South Korea The number of Instagram users have continuously increased, while Facebook's user numbers had declined. Instagram seems to be widely used by Koreans aged under ** years old, with the share of active users dropping significantly after this age. Facebook, a social media giant, which had a largely increased usage penetration in 2020, had recently come under scrutiny for its user privacy policies. User penetration has declined since then.On-the-go media Social media networks are becoming more and more mobile. Globally, mobile social media users have been increasing, and will continue to do so into the foreseeable future. South Korea is not excluded from this trend - the country leads the world in terms of mobile phone penetration. With South Korea’s smartphone ownership rate at ** percent, the success of social media services in the country looks likely to be determined by how well received they are in the mobile app market.

According to a survey conducted in the second and third quarter of 2024, ** percent of South Koreans reported to use KakaoTalk. KakaoTalk is a messaging app developed in South Korea and owned by Kakao Corporation. Kakao TalkKakaoTalk, often referred to as KaTalk, is a free mobile messenger for smartphones. Since its launch in 2010, it has grown to have around **** million monthly active users in the fourth quarter of 2024. While the application is free to use, the company sells so-called emoticons in their app-shop and operates a gift system. Emoticons are stickers, most often depicting popular characters, that the users can send to their contacts in the chatrooms. Kakao’s own characters, “Kakao Friends” became fashionable enough to be sold in KakaoTalk merchandise stores all over the country. As of 2017, it was reported that the company was selling around 5,500 sticker packs in their mobile store. Social media usageSouth Korea has the one of the fastest internet worldwide as well as an internet penetration rate of over ** percent. Naturally, the majority of citizens use social media on a daily basis. While older generations prefer domestic platforms, like Naver BAND, international platforms, like Facebook or Instagram, were more popular among younger social media users. Nevertheless, YouTube is widely popular among South Koreans of all ages. In a survey among 19 to 59-year-old consumers, only *** percent of respondents stated that they have never heard of the streaming platform. According to Reuters, around ** percent of respondents aged 55 years or older used YouTube as a news source.

** percent of South Korean respondents answer our survey on "Most used social media platforms by type" with "Instant messengers (e.g., WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, WeChat)". The survey was conducted in 2023, among ****** consumers.Find this and more survey data on most used social media platforms by type in our Consumer Insights tool. Filter by countless demographics, drill down to your own, hand-tailored target audience, and compare results across countries worldwide.

According to a survey conducted by Rakuten Insight in South Korea in 2025 on social commerce, close to **** percent of respondents answered that they used Instagram for purchases during the last 12 months. YouTube followed with a response share of around ** percent.

This statistic presents a ranking of the most popular social networks in South Korea according to social media users. As of December 2015, 59.8 percent of survey respondents named Facebook as their most-used social networking service.

*********************** and *********************************************** are the top two answers among South Korean consumers in our survey on the subject of "Most common social media activities".The survey was conducted online among 13,014 respondents in South Korea, in 2025.

This statistic shows the results of a survey about social media usage and awareness in South Korea in June 2018. According to this survey, almost ** percent of participants stated they primarily consumed funny texts and videos and current hot issues or trends on social media.

According to a survey conducted in South Korea in 2025, around ** percent of respondents stated that they use YouTube as a news source. This was followed by the South Korean messenger app KakaoTalk at ** percent. Relative low trust in news The usage rate of YouTube as a news source was especially high for South Koreans aged between 55 years and older. Meanwhile, around one in five South Koreans stated that they trusted news on social media. All in all, South Koreans were found to be rather skeptic of news in their country. A survey by Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism found that the share of South Koreans who trust the news was relatively low. News consumption  According to the South Korean government, the share of news readers in South Korea fell from around **** percent in 2011 to around **** percent in 2021. The share was especially low for South Korean aged 60 years and above, and especially high for South Koreans in their thirties. Meanwhile, the share of online newspaper readers among news readers increased up to **** percent in 2021.

According to a survey conducted in South Korea in 2023, around ** percent of respondents aged between 18 and 24 years old stated that they were using social media. The share of social media users increased across most age groups compared to the previous year. Facebook and Instagram While domestic social media networks like Kakao Story or Naver Band enjoy wide popularity in South Korea, Instagram was the most frequently used social media in South Korea, overtaking Facebook. As of March 2024, Instagram had around **** million users, while Facebook had about **** million users in South Korea alone. Nevertheless, the popularity of Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, is undeniable, especially among younger generations. While the number of Facebook users is decreasing, the number of Instagram users is increasing. Social media usageThe majority of users were using social media for its original purpose: socializing. It was also popular to check posts or contents created by other users of the same social media platform. A 2024 survey found that ** percent of respondents aged 25 to 34 years stated that they used social media to read news. While the platform of choice differed, YouTube was the most common social media platform used for news.

As of the third quarter of 2024, Kakaotalk was named as the most favorite social media platform in South Korea by around ** percent of respondents in a survey. It was far ahead of Instagram at **** percent.

According to a survey conducted by Rakuten Insight in South Korea in 2025 on social commerce, approximately **** percent of respondents aged 16 to 24 years old stated they used Instagram for purchasing something during the last 12 months. Instagram was the most commonly used platform among respondents between 16 and 44 years old, while KakaoTalk and YouTube were most commonly used for social commerce for those 45 years and older.

According to a survey conducted in South Korea in early 2025, around ** percent of respondents aged 55 years and older stated that they used social media platforms as a source for news, making them the age group with the highest share of people to do so. The overall use of social media as a news source fell slightly to 42 percent that year, with YouTube being the most popular platform for news.

According to a survey conducted in 2020, the most used social media among South Korean members of Generation Z was Facebook, with **** percent of respondents answering to use it. In line with the decreasing user penetration of Facebook, the usage rate among Generation Z also decreased compared to the previous year.

According to a survey conducted in South Korea in 2023, around ** percent of Gen Z respondents stated that they used Instagram. This was the most commonly used social media platform across all generations except for baby boomers, who most preferred Naver Band. This platform, alongside Facebook and Kakao Story tended to be more popular among older generations.

As of early 2025, Saudi Arabia had the highest social media penetration rate globally out of selected countries and territories, with a whopping 102 percent. UAE and South Korea followed, with 96 percent and 94 percent of active usage reach, respectively. Kenya, Ghana, and Nigeria had some of the lowest social network penetration rates in the world, with less than 26 percent of the population accessing social media in each country. How many people use social media? Although the top three countries with the highest social media penetration rates globally were in Eastern and Southwestern Asia in 2023, the region with the greatest social media reach was Northern Europe with 83.6 percent, followed by Western Europe with 83.3 percent and Southern Europe with 76.7 percent. In 2022, more than 4.59 billion people reported using social media, and this number is projected to reach almost six billion by 2027. Facebook: the most popular social network Meta’s Facebook, the social media giant and the first platform to reach this kind of scale, was the leading social network as of October 2023 with more than three billion global monthly active users (MAU). Additionally, Meta owns four of the biggest social media platforms, all with more than one billion MAU each: Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger. As of January 2023, India was home to Facebook’s largest audience with more than 300 million MAU, followed by the United States with 175 million MAU.

This statistic depicts the most frequently accessed social media among users aged 18 to 24 years in South Korea in 2018. During the measured time period, **** percent of social media users aged between 18 to 24 years in South Korea accessed Facebook the most.

According to a survey conducted in South Korea in the third quarter of 2023, around ** percent of respondents answered that they mostly followed social media accounts of friends, family, or other people they knew. This coincides with the fact that most people mainly use social media for socializing. Other than for socializing, social media are also commonly used to follow influencer accounts. Popular social media accounts Naturally, celebrities and, as the name suggests, influencers have large followings. Among those, K-pop artists specifically were most followed as certain artists and groups have very dedicated fans. This has culminated in all leading positions in terms of followers on Instagram being taken up by members of either girl group BLACKPINK or boy group BTS. Social media usage in South Korea In South Korea, a country known for its high internet speed and coverage, the usage rate of social media is similarly high. Around ** percent of the population used such services in 2023, and this is only estimated to increase further. Social media were also used by a variety of age groups, with only those under 18 and over 55 years old showing a significantly lower usage level. The most used social networking service in South Korea remains the mobile messenger KakaoTalk.

According to a survey conducted among South Koreans on their which social media had the most advertisements in 2021, around **** percent of surveyed South Koreans stated they perceived YouTube as one of the social networks with the most advertisements, followed by Instagram.

According to a survey conducted in 2020, the most used social media among Millennials in South Korea was Instagram, with **** percent of respondents answering to use it. Following was Facebook with a user share of **** percent.

The number of social media users in South Korea was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2029 by in total 2.3 million users (+5.24 percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the social media user base is estimated to reach 46.21 million users and therefore a new peak in 2029. Notably, the number of social media users of was continuously increasing over the past years.The shown figures regarding social media users have been derived from survey data that has been processed to estimate missing demographics.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).Find more key insights for the number of social media users in countries like Japan and China.