Market leader Facebook was the first social network to surpass one billion registered accounts and currently sits at more than three billion monthly active users. Meta Platforms owns four of the biggest social media platforms, all with more than one billion monthly active users each: Facebook (core platform), WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Instagram. In the third quarter of 2023, Facebook reported around four billion monthly core Family product users. The United States and China account for the most high-profile social platforms Most top ranked social networks with more than 100 million users originated in the United States, but services like Chinese social networks WeChat, QQ or video sharing app Douyin have also garnered mainstream appeal in their respective regions due to local context and content. Douyin’s popularity has led to the platform releasing an international version of its network: a little app called TikTok. How many people use social media? The leading social networks are usually available in multiple languages and enable users to connect with friends or people across geographical, political, or economic borders. In 2022, Social networking sites are estimated to reach 3.96 billion users and these figures are still expected to grow as mobile device usage and mobile social networks increasingly gain traction in previously underserved markets.

As of February 2021, YouTube had a global penetration rate of 62 percent, followed closely by Meta's Facebook, with 61 percent. Overall, instant messaging service WhatsApp had a global penetration rate of 52 percent. Additionally, 12 percent of people used TikTok, and one in ten people around the world use messaging service Telegram.

Global ad spend were expected to reach over $134 billion in 2022. This means that it has increased by over 17% yearly.

Which countries spent the most and least time on social media?

I’ve compiled a list of the latest social media user statistics showing just how big social media has become and where it’s likely to go in the future.

59% of adults in the united states are using Instagram daily.

These are the key social media statistics that you need to know.

TikTok comes in 6th position in a list of the world’s most-used social media sites today.

In March 2023, Facebook accounted for 45 percent of all social media site visits in the United States, confirming its position as the leading social media website by far. Other social media platforms, despite their popularity, had to make do with smaller shares of visits across desktop, mobile, and tablet devices combined. Pinterest ranked second with 21 percent of all U.S. social media site visits, while Instagram accounted for 14 percent of the total visits in the country. Additionally, the U.S. is home to the third largest social media audience worldwide.

Facebook: mobile vs desktop usage

At the beginning of 2022, around 81 percent of Facebook users across the globe were using the platform’s social networking services exclusively via mobile phone, while only 1.5 percent reported using their desktop or laptop devices. In October 2021, three Facebook Inc. products occupied the leading positions as most downloaded social networking apps on the Apple App Store in the United States. Facebook’s social media platform ranked first with nearly 2.5 million downloads, while Facebook-owned instant-messaging services Messenger and WhatsApp followed with 2.1 million and 1.4 million downloads respectively.

Social media evolution

Between 2012 and 2020, the daily time spent on social networks worldwide experienced a constant increase, with users reaching an average of 145 minutes per day in 2019 and maintaining the same engagement levels throughout 2020. However, users’ favorite platforms have changed since 2019, and the power balance appears to be shifting further from Facebook’s market dominance. Not only Facebook’s user growth rate is estimated to slow down in the next years, but users belonging to Generation Z appear to prefer video-first social platforms like Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube.

Social media addiction statistics show that over 210 million people worldwide suffer from social media addiction.

56.5% of Facebook users worldwide are male. This is in direct contrast to only 43.5% of Facebook being female.

The average Twitter user spends 5.1 hours per month on the platform.

Facebook is fast approaching 3 billion monthly active users. That’s about 36% of the world’s entire population that log in and use Facebook at least once a month.

Social media's influence in the United Kingdom continues to grow, with 56.2 million active users as of January 2024, representing 82.8 percent of the population. This penetration rate surpasses the global average of 62.3 percent, positioning the UK as a leader in social media adoption. The country's high usage reflects a broader trend of increasing social media engagement worldwide, particularly in Northern and Western Europe. Global social media landscape The social media landscape is rapidly evolving, with China currently hosting over one billion users and India projected to become the largest social media audience by 2029. Notably, Nigeria is expected to see a staggering 142 percent increase in its online networking audience between 2023 and 2029. In 2024, global social media users spent an average of 143 minutes per day on social networks. Facebook is still the market leader Facebook is the most widely utilized social media platform globally, and India boasts 378 million Facebook users, making it the leading country in terms of Facebook audience size. As of April 2024, it was found that men between the ages of 25 and 34 were the largest audience for Facebook, accounting for 18.4 percent of global users. Furthermore, Facebooks second-largest audience base could be found with men aged 18 to 24 years.

Chinese citizens displayed a strong online presence, having approximately 1.08 billion active social media users as of February 2025. Other Asia-Pacific countries and regions appeared to trail behind China in terms of their social media engagement. India and Indonesia, the second- and third-ranked countries in terms of number of active social media users, had 491 million and 143 million active social media users, respectively. Leading social media platforms Facebook reigns worldwide and in the Asia-Pacific region as the most-used social media site, having displayed an increasing number of daily active users. However, Asian social networks, such as WeChat and Douyin, have also gained immense popularity in the Asia-Pacific region by offering content and services tailored to APAC preferences. Acting not only as a messaging and social media service, WeChat is a platform for online shopping and payment services. The social networking site, owned by Tencent, was the sixth most used social media platform globally. A connected region The Asia-Pacific region has gone through a technological evolution and alongside the region, its citizens have willingly adopted this change. This is conveyed through the internet penetration rate, which has more than doubled since 2010 in Asia. A better internet infrastructure has catalyzed the emergence of social media throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

A global survey conducted in the third quarter of 2024 found that the main reason for using social media was to keep in touch with friends and family, with over 50.8 percent of social media users saying this was their main reason for using online networks. Overall, 39 percent of social media users said that filling spare time was their main reason for using social media platforms, whilst 34.5 percent of respondents said they used it to read news stories. Less than one in five users were on social platforms for the reason of following celebrities and influencers. The most popular social network Facebook dominates the social media landscape. The world's most popular social media platform turned 20 in February 2024, and it continues to lead the way in terms of user numbers. As of February 2025, the social network had over three billion global users. YouTube, Instagram, and WhatsApp follow, but none of these well-known brands can surpass Facebook’s audience size. Moreover, as of the final quarter of 2023, there were almost four billion Meta product users. Ever-evolving social media usage The utilization of social media remains largely gratuitous; however, companies have been encouraging users to become paid subscribers to reduce dependence on advertising profits. Meta Verified entices users by offering a blue verification badge and proactive account protection, among other things. X (formerly Twitter), Snapchat, and Reddit also offer users the chance to upgrade their social media accounts for a monthly free.

Global Social Media Market to hit USD 466.56B by 2029 growing at 13% CAGR. Explore trends, drivers, and competition for strategic insights with The Business Research Company.

There are over 875 million registered users on LinkedIn in 2024.

According to a survey, Facebook was the most popular social media platform for live streaming shopping, used for this activity by nearly 58 percent of global internet users. Instagram ranked second, with 46 percent of respondents, followed by TikTok, with almost 16 percent.

There are over 1.5 billion registered users on Instagram in 2024.