According to data gathered in a survey held in 2022, 17 percent of responding U.S. adults said that they got their news from social media on a regular basis, down from 19 percent in the previous year and 23 percent 2020. After a growth of people who claimed to never get news from social media from 21 percent in 2020 to 24 percent in 2021, this share dropped back to 21 percent in 2022.

A survey held in the United States in 2023 revealed that 40 percent of responding adults said that what they disliked most about getting news on social media was the fact that the news is inaccurate, an increase of nine percent from 2018. Other reasons given were low-quality news or other people's behavior. Social media news consumption is complex With inaccurate news being the main reason consumers dislike news via social networks, the issue of trust also comes into play. Whilst fake and manipulated content can circulate on any platform, social media platforms can exacerbate the matter, with written posts, video footage, and audio easily shared and disseminated at the click of a button. TikTok in particular, with its focus on short-form snappy content, ranked poorly in terms of trusted social networks - 50 percent of U.S. adults responding to a survey considered the platform very untrustworthy. What are the positives of news found on social media? Data from 2023 showed that 20 percent of adults in the United States who used social media to get news stated that convenience was their main reason for doing so. Speed and interaction with people were the two next most popular reasons for using social networking platforms as a source of news. Even so, the majority (more than a third) of respondents said they did not know why they liked getting news on social networks or did not answer. This speaks to the complex relationship the public now has with social media – its convenience, as well as its prevalence in users’ everyday lives, means that it can often be difficult to avoid using it. However, when it comes to news, users remain unsure.

Following the 2016 US presidential election, many have expressed concern about the effects of false stories ("fake news"), circulated largely through social media. We discuss the economics of fake news and present new data on its consumption prior to the election. Drawing on web browsing data, archives of fact-checking websites, and results from a new online survey, we find: 1) social media was an important but not dominant source of election news, with 14 percent of Americans calling social media their "most important" source; 2) of the known false news stories that appeared in the three months before the election, those favoring Trump were shared a total of 30 million times on Facebook, while those favoring Clinton were shared 8 million times; 3) the average American adult saw on the order of one or perhaps several fake news stories in the months around the election, with just over half of those who recalled seeing them believing them; and 4) people are much more likely to believe stories that favor their preferred candidate, especially if they have ideologically segregated social media networks.

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 the fall of 2006 the American National Election Studies (ANES) carried out a pilot study after the 2006 mid-term elections in the United States. The 2006 ANES Pilot Study was conducted for the purpose of testing new questions and conducting methodological research to inform the design of future ANES studies. As such, it is not considered part of the ANES time series that has been conducted since 1948, and the pilot study only includes time series questions necessary to evaluate the new content. The election studies are designed to present data on Americans' social backgrounds, enduring political predispositions, social and political values, perceptions and evaluations of groups and candidates, opinions on questions of public policy, and participation in political life. This full release dataset contains all 675 interviews, with the survey portion of the interview lasting just over 37 minutes on average. The study had a re-interview rate of 56.25 percent. Respondents were asked questions over a variety of topics. They were queried on need for closure in various situations including unpredictable ones, how fast important decisions were made, and how often they could see that both people can be right when in disagreement. Respondents were asked many questions pertaining to their values. Some questions dealt with optimism and pessimism. Respondents were asked if they felt that were generally optimistic, pessimistic, or neither in regard to the future. They were asked specifically how they felt about the future of the United States. Respondents were also asked about their social networks, about who they talked to in the last six months, and how close they felt to them. Respondents were further queried about how many days in the last six months they talked to these people, their political views, interest in politics, and the amount of time it would take to drive to their homes. Other questions sought respondents' political attitudes including attentiveness to following politics, ambivalence, efficacy, and trust in government. Respondents were asked questions related to the media such as how much time and how many days during a typical week they watched or read news on the Internet, newspaper, radio, or television. Questions that dealt with abortion consisted of giving respondents various scenarios and asking if they favored or opposed it being legal for the women to have an abortion in that circumstance. The issue of justice was also included by asking respondents what percent of people of different backgrounds who are suspected of committing a crime in America are treated fairly. Respondents were also asked to give their opinion on gender in politics, specifically, whether gender played a role in how the respondent would vote for various political offices. Respondents were also queried on whether they would vote for Bill Clinton or George W. Bush and whether they had voted in the elections in November. Respondents were also asked if they approved of the way George W. Bush was handling his job as president, the way he was handling relations with foreign countries, and the way he was dealing with terrorism. Respondents were also asked how upsetting the thought of their own death was, and how likely it was that a majority of all people on Earth would die at once during the next 100 years because of a single event. Demographic variables include age, party affiliation, sex, religious preference, and political party affiliation.

TikTok news consumption is on the rise. Back in 2020, just three percent of respondents to a survey held in the United States stated that they regularly got their news from TikTok. By 2024, this figure had increased almost sixfold to 17 percent. Younger adults – those aged between 18 and 29 years old – are the most frequent TikTok news users, with almost 40 percent getting news there on a regular basis, double that of adults between 30 and 49 years and more than ten times the share of adults aged 65 and above. The rise of TikTok as a news source TikTok’s penetration rate in the U.S. is highest among adults aged between 18 and 24 years. More than three quarters of consumers in this age bracket use the platform, and for teens aged between 12 and 17 years, the figure was similarly high at almost 70 percent. These young users are those driving TikTok’s growing popularity as a news source. Whilst X (formerly known as Twitter) remains the most used social network for news, TikTok is rapidly catching up. Alongside Facebook, TikTok now ranks as the second most popular social media site for news consumption, with 43 percent of U.S. adults regularly using each platform to keep up to date, and TikTok is set to overtake Facebook in the next year in this respect. The share of U.S. adults using Facebook for news fell consistently in every year from 2020 to 2023, whereas in the same time period, the share getting news via TikTok almost doubled. The most popular news publishers on TikTok According to the most recently available data, the leading news publisher on TikTok in the U.S. is socially native brand NowThis, with 5.5 million followers. Targeting left-leaning younger consumers, NowThis describes itself as social media’s number one video news brand. Ranking second, third, and fourth respectively are broadcast TV news outlets ABC, NBC, and CBS with between three and five million followers. Meanwhile, left-leaning cable network CNN had less success with a follower count of under 1.5 million.

A study examining perspectives on the news media from over 40 countries revealed that levels of trust differed notably around the world. Scandinavians in particular had greater trust in the news media than citizens from other parts of the world, with 69 percent of Finns trusting the news, along with 57 percent of Danes and 55 percent of Norwegians. Who trusts the news the least? South Korea and Taiwan were placed among the lowest in the world when it came to how much consumers trusted the news media, alongside Hungary, Slovakia, and Bulgaria. Media sources in some of these countries can be considered to be insufficiently independent from the establishment. Just 23 percent of Greek consumers had trust in the news media, the lowest among all countries in the report. What affects trust in news? One factor which can greatly affect trust in news is the outlet used. Globally, social media is seen as a less reliable source of news, and in the EU radio and television are viewed as more dependable. In the current climate of fake news and polarizing political events, young people around the world are having a tough time relying on the mass media , although this attitude is also seen among older generations.

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.

As of January 2025, La Prensa – published by Organización Editorial Mexicana (OEM) – had an average daily circulation of 172.4 thousand, ranking third on a list of paid daily newspapers. It was estimated that overall newspaper revenue in Mexico would add up to 996 million U.S. dollars in 2027. The future of newspapers in Mexico Almost one out of five internet users surveyed in Mexico paid for digital news in early 2024, the second-highest percentage in the Latin America region. The willingness to pay for quality information also paves the way for the segment at large. The print newspaper revenue in Mexico was forecast to decline by 6.5 percent between 2022 and 2025, whereas the digital subsegment was projected to grow by more than 20 percent. There is also a sign that the prestige of print has translated into the online environment. At the beginning of 2024, the leading online news brands in Mexico by weekly reach were the web versions of physical newspapers, such as El Universal or the websites of local newspapers. News consumption in Mexico also going digital News consumption in Mexico remains high, especially via digital platforms. Early 2024 data shows that the internet, including social media, is the go-to news source for 79 percent of respondents in the country. In comparison, only 18 percent of news consumers in Mexico used print media for this purpose and 39 percent watched TV to get the news. Facebook leads the pack among other social networks used to access news, followed by YouTube and WhatsApp.