Usage of social media sites has been increasing every year as people find more and more activities to invest their time on these platforms. Along with being a major source of news and information, internet users have also been able to interact with their favorite brands, connect with their loved ones, share their content like photos and videos, and play mini-games with other internet users.
Activities like these are limitless on social media platforms which keep the internet users engaged. Internet users in the United States are also hooked to social … Data from Comcast shows a surge in internet subscribers in the second quarter of 2021.
Comcast’s Xfinity is available in 39 states in the US and internet users in those areas have been making use of the Xfinity internet deals to access social media platforms and other online activities.
Nonetheless, there doesn’t seem to be a decline in internet usage, rather more and more internet users are interested in signing up to and upgrading their internet connection.
This article will be using stats from Hootsuite to show calculated usage of social media platforms and the extent of hours that social media users have invested in these platforms.
Hootsuite has found data on the number of internet users all over the world who have social media platforms. When looking over the data, the number of active users should be measured instead of the number of user accounts on the social media platform.
According to Hootsuite data collection for the year 2021, there are around 4.55 billion active internet users all over the world. That constitutes 57.6% of the world’s population.
Out of 7.89 billion people, there are 4.88 billion internet users worldwide (61.8% of the world’s population). 4.1% of the internet users worldwide are not active on social media.
To narrow it down by country, the report shows the largest number of active users reside in Northern and Western Europe, 79% of each of their entire population of internet users.
74% from North America and 72% from Southern America have active social media users. It falls to 31% in Southern Asia, to 10% in Eastern Africa, and 8% in Middle Africa.
If we look at the most used social media platform being used by social media users, Facebook has conquered the social media domain by having the most active users of 2.8 billion.
Others that come a bit closer to Facebook include YouTube has 2.2 billion users, WhatsApp with 2 billion users, and Instagram with its 1.3 billion active users. WeChat is the most popular social media platform that is widely used in China and has 1.2 billion active users.
Then there are TikTok with its 700 million active users, Snapchat having 500 million internet users, and Twitter with around 300 million users. Out of all of these social media platforms, Facebook is the fastest growing social media platform and it doesn’t look like any other social media platform is gonna beat it to it.
Data from Pew Research has estimated that there is a significant gender difference in how men and women social media users in the US view social media platforms. 64% of women are more invested in Facebook than men who are at 35%. 56% of men scroll through the YouTube channel more than 43% women.
TikTok, which is the up-and-coming social media platform and quickly gaining momentum towards being the most used social media app, has 68% more women users and 30% fewer men. Snapchat is mostly used by women (59) than men (40%).
The micro-blogging social media platform called Twitter has around 56% more male internet users and 43% female internet users. Hence, men and women have their own preferences of social media platforms and gender difference is also an important factor in studying the usage of social media platforms.
Consumers claim that they use social media platforms such as Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Reddit, and Twitter to keep up with the information about products and services of their favorite brands.
How they view the posts about their favorite products and services also matters and marketers are very much aware of how to gain the consumers’ involvement on social media platforms.
The global survey conducted by Statista reported that around 93% of the social media marketers use the platform to promote their businesses, while the other 78% did the same through Instagram. Facebook being the most used social media platform is facing increased competition with Instagram and YouTube gaining popularity in marketing campaigns.
Conclusion
It is amazing to see how quickly social media platforms are being adopted by hundreds of internet users daily. Data is collected every month, or quarter or year, keeps changing and getting updated and the total number of social media users is expected to cover more than half the world’s population by 2025.