According to data gathered in a survey held in 2024, ** percent of responding U.S. adults said that they got their news from social media often, the highest recorded in the time period shown. After a growth of people who claimed to never get news from social media from ** percent in 2020 to 32 percent in 2021, this share dropped back to ** percent in 2024.

Social media is one of the go-to news sources in the United States – over one third of U.S. adults responding to a 2022 survey got their news from social media platforms every day, and a further 22 percent did so a few times or at least once per week. After the surge in social media news consumption in 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, daily engagement fell in 2021, but the increase the following year suggests that daily news access on social networks could continue to grow in years to come.

The most popular social sites for news

An annual report surveying U.S. adults from 2019 to 2022 revealed that Facebook was the most popular social network used for news, followed by YouTube. Important to note here though is that TikTok was not included in the survey question for those years, a platform increasingly popular with younger generations. Whilst the share of adults regularly using TikTok for news aged 50 years or above was just five percent, among those aged between 18 and 29 years the figure was over five times higher.

Meanwhile, Twitter is journalists’ preferred social media site, with the share who use Twitter for their job at almost 70 percent. Since Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter however, some journalists raised concerns about the future of free speech on the platform.

Gen Z and social media news consumption

A 2022 survey found that half of all Gen Z respondents used social media for news every day. Gen Z is driving growth in social media news usage, a trend which will continue if the younger consumers belonging to this generation increase their engagement with news as they age.

A global survey conducted in March 2020 revealed that the coronavirus has had a direct impact on in-home media consumption around the world, with ** percent of total respondents professing to have read more books or listened to more audiobooks at home and ** percent having listened to more radio due to the COVID-19 pandemic, whilst more than ** percent of consumers spent longer on messaging services and social media. Interestingly, although at least ** percent of respondents in most countries said that they were watching more news coverage, figures for Australia and the United States were lower, amounting to just ** and ** percent respectively. Australians were also the least likely to be reading more newspapers; just **** percent of consumers said that they were doing so compared to the global total of ** percent. Whilst ** percent of Italians were spending longer on messaging services, in Japan the same was true for only ***** percent of respondents, and survey participants from China and the Philippines were by far the most likely to be spending more time on music streaming services.For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Fact and Figures page.

The coronavirus outbreak has caused media consumption to increase in countries across the globe, with book reading and audiobook listening up by ** percent, social media usage seeing an increase of ** percent, and news consumption rising by ** percent. Some consumers were more engaged with the news than others, with the share of Australians and French respondents who significantly increased their news consumption standing at around ***** to *** percent lower than the global total. Perhaps unsurprisingly, comparatively few people spent more time reading newspapers and magazines or listening to the radio (all media pastimes which have waned in popularity in recent years) but time spent on social media and video streaming services grew substantially in some countries, particularly the Philippines. Meanwhile, in nearby Singapore social media usage time grew by just ** percent.For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Fact and Figures page.

According to a survey carried out in 2020, six out of ten online news consumers in Colombia access this type of content through links posted by others on social media. Moreover, 47 percent of people surveyed in the South American country that year follows digital news portals on this type of platforms. The most commonly used device for online news consumption in Colombia that same year was the smartphone.

According to a study conducted in March 2020, ** percent of adults in selected countries affected by the coronavirus pandemic were searching for and accessing information about the virus and how it is spreading several times per day. Coronavirus news consumption frequency was highest in Italy, South Korea, and Japan, where ** percent or more of respondents from these countries professed to be seeking out news and updates multiple times over the course of a day as information is published, whereas in France and Germany, two of the most affected countries in Europe, just ** percent of adults were keeping themselves updated more than once daily.

Data from a survey held in August 2022 in the United States revealed that the most popular news source among millennials was social media, with 45 percent of respondents reporting daily news consumption on social networks. This was more than double the share who got their news via radio. When it comes to trust, though, social media does not fare well.

Social media and news consumption

As adults of all ages spend more and more time on social media, news consumption via this avenue is likely to increase, but something which could affect this trend is the lack of trust in the news consumers encounter on social platforms. Although now the preferred option for younger audiences, social networks are among the least trusted news sources in the United States, and concerns about fake news remain prevalent.

Young audiences and fake news

Inaccurate news is a major problem which worsened during the 2016 and 2020 presidential election campaigns and the COVID-19 pandemic. A global study found that most Gen Z and Millennial news consumers ignored fake coronavirus news on social media, but almost 20 percent interacted with such posts in the comments section, and over seven percent shared the content. Younger news consumers in the United States were also the most likely to report feeling overwhelmed by COVID-19 news. As younger audiences were the most likely to get their updates on the outbreak via social media, this also made them the most susceptible to fake news, and younger generations are also the most prone to ‘doomscrolling’, an addictive act where the reader pursues and digests multiple negative or upsetting news articles in one sitting.

In Argentina, news links posted in social media by users were the most popular way to access to digital news, as reported by 56 percent of participants of a survey carried out in 2020. Visiting digital news portals was the second most common way to consume this type of content in the South American country, with 54 percent of respondents. In contrast, news apps registered a low penetration rate that year, with only six percent. That same year, over half of Argentine respondents said that they consume online news several times a day.

According to a survey carried out in Mexico in 2020, the smartphone was the most popular device to access to online news media among male and female respondents, though women showing a slight larger preference for this kind of tool. For both men and women surveyed, computer was chosen to be the second favorite tool to consume online news media, but with a largest share of male participants: 59 of percent. That same year, four out of ten Mexican survey respondents of a similar study stated that they read online news several times a day.

During a survey fielded in Mexico in 2020, ** percent of respondents who said they read digital news at least once a week stated they did so several times a day. In Colombia, the share amounted to ** percent.

During a survey fielded in Colombia in 2020, ** percent of respondents who said they read digital news at least once a week stated they did so several times a day. In Argentina, the share amounted to ** percent.

In 2020, the daily time Brazilians spent consuming online news between ******** and ** was ** percent higher compared to the period between ********* and ********. The first case of a person infected with the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) in Brazil was reported on ***********, 2020. The lock for non-essential business started on ********. For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

Over ** percent of respondents surveyed in Brazil in 2020 reported to access digital news media through links posted on social media by other people. More than half go directly to a news media website in order to get informed. That same year, the most trusted digital news media in Brazil was G1.

In March 2020, in-home media consumption increased globally, and another survey by the same source held in May 2020 revealed that many consumers were still engaging with media at home more than usual. The data varied by country, with ** percent of Indian consumers and ** percent of Brazilians saying that they had begun creating or uploading videos at home since the outbreak, whereas the global average was just ** percent. Indian consumers were also more likely to be reading magazines or newspapers at home, whereas print media consumption in New Zealand and Romania was far below the global average. For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Fact and Figures page.

The average daily time spent with digital media in the United States is expected to increase from *** minutes (seven hours and 19 minutes) in 2022 to close to ***** hours in 2025. Higher online media consumption in 2020 was partially attributed to the coronavirus outbreak. Impact of COVID-19 on media consumption In-home media consumption grew sharply in March 2020 in the first stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. More than ** percent of U.S. respondents reported spending more time watching shows and films on streaming services, and ** percent were reading books or listening to audiobooks more than usual. Despite predictions that this spike in media usage would fall after the initial implementation of shelter-in-place orders, consumers also continued spending more time with media in the summer of 2020. The same survey, held in July that year, also asked participants about their plans to continue with their increased media consumption after the pandemic has run its course. This garnered different responses, with only a handful of U.S. adults planning to carry on investing more time in most media activities. Again though, watching movies and shows on streaming platforms and reading or listening to books were the most popular options.

According to a survey carried out in 2020, the smartphone was the most commonly used device to access digital news media among all age groups surveyed in Colombia that year, though with a lesser penetration rate among respondents aged 50 to 65 years. On the contrary, this group exhibited the highest use of computers and tablets for this purpose, with ** and ** percent, respectively. In that year, El Tiempo was the most accessed digital news media by Colombian respondents.

According to data collected during the first quarter of 2020, adults aged 18 to 34 spent more time browsing the web via smartphone than any other age group in the United States. Overall media consumption was highest among adults aged 50 to 64 during that period. Traditional media Traditional media is gradually losing its appeal to younger, more tech-savvy generations. While television consumption is ******* among adults who have not grown up with the internet or other digital channels, young Millennials and Gen Z tend to prefer non-linear forms of news and entertainment. Data on the median age of media users in the U.S. showed that the average age of TV viewers and print magazine readers was higher than that of internet users in 2020, and similar generational trends can be observed in many digitally developed markets globally. Impact of COVID-19 on media usage The onset of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic boosted media consumption across the United States and worldwide in 2020. While the average time spent with traditional media ********* for the first time in over a decade, digital media consumption saw a particularly impressive spike that year due to remote working and schooling setups. In the following years, the gap between traditional and digital media consumption is expected to widen even further.

A global survey conducted in July 2020 found that Gen Z consumers were far more likely to watch more videos due to the coronavirus outbreak, with ** percent reporting an increase in consumption of videos for example on YouTube, compared to ** percent of Millennials and ** percent of Gen X consumers. There was also an increase in the share of Gen Z respondents listening to more streaming services, spending longer on messaging services and social media, and watching more news coverage. Gen Z were the most likely to have increased their usage of streaming services, with ** percent of respondents reporting watching more shows and films during the COVID outbreak.For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Fact and Figures page.

According to the results produced by a global survey conducted in March 2020, Gen Z consumers were far more likely to spend more time on messaging services at home due to the coronavirus outbreak, with ** percent saying that they using services like WhatsApp for longer than usual, compared to ** percent of Millennials and ** percent of Gen X consumers. Additionally, more Gen Z respondents were listening to more podcasts, reading more books or listening to more audiobooks, increasing their social media usage, and creating or uploading videos to the likes of Tik Tok or YouTube. Between ** and ** percent of consumers in all age groups were watching more news coverage due to the COVID-19 pandemic, whilst Millennials were the most likely to be reading more newspapers or magazines than their younger or older peers.For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Fact and Figures page.

During a survey fielded in Mexico in 2020, ** percent of respondents aged 18 to 39 years stated that their favorite device to read news online was a smartphone. This device was also the most popular among survey participants between 40 and 65 years old, though with a slight smaller share of respondents. According to the same survey, El Universal was Mexico's best known digital news media.