122 Social Media Statistics October 2026

Social media statistics for 2026 describe a channel that is still growing, despite years of headlines about its decline. DataReportal counts 294 million new social media user identities in the 12 months to April 2026, about 9.3 new users every second (DataReportal, Digital 2026 Mid-Year Global Update, Apr 2026). The growth is in video feeds and messaging. Older text feeds are standing still or shrinking.

For marketers the shift is about reach. Platforms now show people what their algorithms pick, not what their friends post. Links get very little distribution, and paid social has become one of the biggest ad channels in the US. People also search, shop and get their news inside these apps, which changes where a brand needs to be found.

Every number below links to the organisation that produced it: platform earnings filings and newsrooms, regulators, Pew Research Center, Ofcom, the Reuters Institute, IAB and PwC, and named vendor surveys, which we label as vendor research. DataReportal's figures combine its own analysis with data from GWI and Similarweb, and we name the producer each time. Content repurposing across social channels is covered on our content marketing statistics page, and search behaviour on SEO statistics.

How many people use social media, and for how long?

Social media has not peaked. The user count still rises every year, and social and video feeds now take more than half of the time online adults spend on all online media, streaming TV included (DataReportal, data from GWI, Oct 2025).

How many social media users are there worldwide?

About 70% of the world's population, if user identities are taken at face value. DataReportal warns that identities are not the same as unique people, since one person can hold several accounts.

• Social media user identities equal 69.9% of the global population (DataReportal, Digital 2026 Mid-Year Global Update, Apr 2026).
• The total grew 5.4% in the 12 months to April 2026 (DataReportal, Digital 2026 Mid-Year Global Update, Apr 2026).
• 94.7% of the world's internet users, of any age, use social media each month (DataReportal, Apr 2026).
• In a survey of more than 240,000 people in 54 economies, 96.7% of internet users aged 16 and over use a social network or messaging app each month (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• Social media user identities stood at just under 2.27 billion in October 2015 (DataReportal, Digital 2026 Global Overview, Oct 2025).
• 54.4% of social media users worldwide are male, based on platform ad audience data (DataReportal, Digital 2026 Global Overview, Oct 2025).

How much time do people spend on social platforms?

A lot, and the platforms report that it is still going up. Video drives most of the increase.

• The typical social media user is active on 6.5 different platforms each month (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• Women aged 16 to 24 spend 25 hours and 45 minutes a week on social and video feeds, more than 3 hours and 40 minutes a day (DataReportal, data from GWI, Oct 2025).
• The typical online adult spends roughly 16% of their waking hours scrolling social and video feeds (DataReportal, data from GWI, Oct 2025).
• Globally, time spent on Instagram grew by double digits year over year in Q2 2026, mostly from better Feed and Reels recommendations (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• UK adults spend an average of four and a half hours online a day, including 51 minutes on YouTube outside the TV set (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).

Why do people open social apps?

Mostly to keep up with friends and family, and second to fill spare time. Reasons differ sharply by platform, which matters for what a brand posts where.

• 49.0% of adult social media users say they use social platforms to keep in touch with friends and family (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• 39.3% use social media to fill spare time, and 30.1% to read news stories (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• More than 80% of TikTok users go there for funny or entertaining content, against 21.3% of Pinterest users (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• More than 7 in 10 Facebook users visit to stay in touch with friends and family, compared with barely a quarter of TikTok users (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• WhatsApp is the favourite social platform of 17.4% of social media users aged 16 and over, the top choice worldwide (DataReportal, data from GWI, Oct 2025).

Which social platforms are growing in 2026?

Meta's apps and YouTube are still the largest by a wide margin, and the newer text feeds remain small. Growth comes from video and from apps that recommend content to people who do not follow the account.

How many people use Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads?

Billions, though the total now grows only slowly.

• Facebook has had more than 2 billion daily active users for some time (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• Threads reached 500 million monthly active users (Meta, Jun 2026).
• WhatsApp peaked at 30 million messages sent per second during the 2026 World Cup final (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• Facebook is the most used platform globally at 56.3% of online adults, and 73.4% when China and Russia are left out (DataReportal, data from GWI, Apr 2026).
• The potential reach of ads on Messenger fell by more than 95% in six months after Meta stopped selling Messenger inbox ads on 11 November 2025 (DataReportal, Apr 2026).

How big are YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest and Reddit?

YouTube is in a class of its own, and the next tier is growing faster than Meta. Ad reach figures from platform tools overstate real audiences, so read them as an upper bound.

• YouTube says its ads reach 2.65 billion users a month, about 10% more than the 2.39 billion Meta reports for Facebook (DataReportal, Apr 2026).
• TikTok reports ad reach of 2.21 billion, ahead of Instagram's 1.99 billion (DataReportal, Apr 2026).
• Similarweb app data shows active use of TikTok's apps fell about 10% between September 2025 and February 2026 (DataReportal, data from Similarweb, Apr 2026).
• TikTok says more than 200 million Americans and 7.5 million US businesses use the app (TikTok USDS Joint Venture, Jan 2026).
• Snapchat had 493 million daily and 971 million monthly active users in Q2 2026 (Snap Inc., Aug 2026).
• Pinterest's monthly active users rose 11% to a record 640 million (Pinterest, Aug 2026).
• Reddit's revenue grew 61% to $805 million in Q2 2026, its eighth straight quarter above 60% growth (Reddit, Jul 2026).

Is X losing ground to Threads and Bluesky?

On users, Threads has passed X on mobile. On engagement, X is still far ahead, and Bluesky remains a fraction of either.

• The Threads mobile app has more than 1.5 times as many monthly active users as the X app (DataReportal, data from Similarweb, Apr 2026).
• The typical Threads user spends 5 minutes a day in the app, against 32 minutes for X users (DataReportal, data from Similarweb, Apr 2026).
• 42.4% of active X users open the app every day, compared with 29.9% for Threads (DataReportal, data from Similarweb, Apr 2026).
• X users average 6.9 sessions a day, about 3.6 times the 1.9 for Threads (DataReportal, data from Similarweb, Apr 2026).
• Bluesky grew from 13 million to more than 43 million global users between October 2024 and March 2026 (Bluesky, Mar 2026).
• 10% of US adults say they use X daily (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• 24% of Republicans now use X, against 19% of Democrats, a reversal from two years earlier (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).

Who uses social media in the US and UK?

Age decides which platform someone uses more than anything else. Facebook is the network of middle-aged adults, Instagram and TikTok belong to people under 30, and teenagers live on YouTube.

Which platforms do US adults use?

Facebook and YouTube reach most US adults, and Instagram is the only other app used by about half. Everything else is a minority platform.

• 71% of US adults use Facebook (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• Half of US adults use Instagram, up from 40% in 2021 (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• 37% use TikTok, up from 21% in 2021 (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• About a third use WhatsApp, up from 23% in 2021 (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• 55% of women use Instagram, compared with 44% of men (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• 62% of Hispanic adults use Instagram, against 45% of White adults (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• 37% of US adults visit Facebook several times a day (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).
• Roughly half of adults aged 18 to 29 go on TikTok daily, compared with 5% of those 65 and older (Pew Research Center, Nov 2025).

How do US teens use social media?

YouTube, TikTok and Instagram dominate. Facebook and X have lost most of their teenage audience over the past decade.

• About six in ten or more US teens use TikTok and Instagram (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• Roughly nine in ten US teens use YouTube (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• 55% of teens use Snapchat, and girls use it more than boys, 61% against 49% (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• About three in ten teens use Facebook, down from 71% in 2014 to 2015 (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• 16% of teens use X, down from 33% a decade earlier (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• 61% of teens go on TikTok every day (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• 21% of teens say they are on TikTok almost constantly, up from 16% in 2022 (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• 36% of teens use at least one of YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat or Facebook almost constantly (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).
• Four in ten teens say they are online almost constantly (Pew Research Center, Dec 2025).

How do UK adults and children use social apps?

UK adults use the same handful of services almost universally. Children spend most of their screen time on two apps, YouTube and Snapchat.

• YouTube is used by 94% of UK adults (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• Facebook and Messenger together reach 93% of UK adults, and WhatsApp reaches 90% (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• UK children aged 8 to 14 spend about 48 minutes a day on YouTube and 45 minutes on Snapchat, together around half of their online time (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• 58% of UK children aged 8 to 14 use TikTok, and 63% use WhatsApp (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• Between 15% and 24% of the time 8 to 14 year olds spend on YouTube, Snapchat, TikTok and WhatsApp falls between 9pm and 5am (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• 72% of 13 to 17 year olds who use social and messaging apps say the apps help them feel closer to friends (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).

Is social media replacing search for discovery and news?

For news, partly. For search, not yet: most searching still happens on search engines, even if social platforms handle a real slice of it. Discovery is where social matters most, because people find products and stories there without looking for them.

How much searching happens on social platforms?

A small but real share, and more than happens in AI chat tools. The study only measured desktop browsers, not mobile apps where most social use happens, so the real social share is likely higher.

• Traditional search engines account for about 80% of US desktop searches, commerce sites for about 10% and social networks for about 5.5% (SparkToro, data from Datos, Mar 2026).
• AI tools make up 3.2% of desktop searches in the same study (SparkToro, data from Datos, Mar 2026).
• Amazon, Bing and YouTube each receive more desktop search activity than ChatGPT (SparkToro, data from Datos, Mar 2026).
• Google's share of these searches fell by 3.5 points during 2025, while Amazon, Bing and YouTube gained (SparkToro, data from Datos, Mar 2026).

Search engines remain the main way people look for something specific. Our SEO statistics page covers how Google's own results are changing.

Do people find brands and products on social media?

Yes. Social ads are one of the top three ways online adults discover new brands, and younger shoppers lean on social for ideas more than older ones.

• More than 30% of adult internet users discover new brands, products and services through ads on social platforms, the third biggest source after search engines and TV ads (DataReportal, data from GWI, Oct 2025).
• Physical stores and social media tie at 46% as consumers' top source of gift ideas (vendor research) (Sprout Social, Sep 2026).
• 54% of Gen Z turn to social media for gift ideas, against 31% of boomers (vendor research) (Sprout Social, Sep 2026).
• 38.8% of US marketing leaders say they now use their social channels to sell more of their products and services (The CMO Survey, Mar 2026).
• 43% of UK children who bought something on social media regretted the purchase (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• 22% of UK children aged 8 to 17 say influencer content encouraged them to spend money online (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).

How many people get their news from social media?

A large share of adults do, and the younger the audience, the bigger the share. Video platforms are taking over from text feeds as the place where people meet the news.

• 53% of US adults at least sometimes get news from social media (Pew Research Center, Sep 2025).
• 38% of US adults regularly get news on Facebook and 35% on YouTube (Pew Research Center, Sep 2025).
• 55% of TikTok users regularly get news there, up from 22% in 2020 (Pew Research Center, Sep 2025).
• 43% of US adults under 30 regularly get news on TikTok, up from 9% in 2020 (Pew Research Center, Sep 2025).
• Facebook is still the biggest platform for news worldwide, used for news by 43% of people, ahead of YouTube at 34% (Reuters Institute, Jun 2026).
• Instagram is now the biggest social platform for news among 18 to 24 year olds, reaching 42% of them (Reuters Institute, Jun 2026).
• 52% of 18 to 24 year olds say social media, video networks and AI chatbots are their main way of getting news (Reuters Institute, Jun 2026).
• 27% of respondents came across news from news-focused creators or influencers in the past week (Reuters Institute, Jun 2026).

What does social media marketing cost, and what does it return?

Paid social is now one of the largest ad channels in the US, and organic reach for brands keeps shrinking. That leaves marketers paying for most of their social reach while the platforms reward native video over links.

How big is social media advertising?

Very big, and still growing faster than most of digital advertising. Meta takes most of the money, and the smaller platforms are growing faster from a lower base.

• Meta's Family of Apps ad revenue was $59.4 billion in Q2 2026, up 27% year over year (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• The number of ad impressions Meta served rose 14%, and the average price per ad rose 12% (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• Meta's Family of Apps other revenue, mostly WhatsApp paid messaging and subscriptions, reached $1 billion in a quarter for the first time, up 73% (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• Meta's AI-run Advantage+ campaigns reached an annual revenue run rate of more than $75 billion (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• Reddit's ad revenue grew 64% to $762 million in Q2 2026 (Reddit, Jul 2026).
• Pinterest's revenue grew 18% to $1.18 billion (Pinterest, Aug 2026).
• Pinterest earns $8.30 per user in the US and Canada, against $0.23 in the rest of the world outside Europe (Pinterest, Aug 2026).
• Snap's revenue grew 19% to $1.6 billion in Q2 2026 (Snap Inc., Aug 2026).

How much organic reach do brand posts get?

Very little for posts that link out, and engagement on most platforms is under 1%. TikTok is the exception, with engagement several times higher than any other network.

• Unconnected posts, recommended from accounts a user does not follow, made up 41.0% of US Facebook Feed views, about twice the 20.1% from friends (Meta, Widely Viewed Content Report, Dec 2025).
• Instagram's median brand engagement rate fell about 17% in a year, its second straight decline (vendor research) (Rival IQ, Mar 2026).
• X's median engagement rate doubled from 0.015% to 0.03%, its first rebound in years (vendor research) (Rival IQ, Mar 2026).
• YouTube's median brand engagement rate is 0.21% (vendor research) (Rival IQ, Mar 2026).
• Brands post 3.7 times a week on Instagram and 2.0 times on TikTok, yet TikTok gets far more engagement (vendor research) (Rival IQ, Mar 2026).
• Facebook posting fell to 3.0 posts a week, the lowest in six years of tracking (vendor research) (Rival IQ, Mar 2026).

Social reach is rented. Pages on your own site that rank in search keep sending visitors after a post stops getting shown.

How do marketers plan to spend on social media?

They expect to keep moving budget into social, and customers expect social to work as a support channel too, with fast replies.

• US marketing leaders expect social media to take 23.1% of their marketing budgets within five years (The CMO Survey, Mar 2026).
• 83.3% of US marketing leaders say marketing is responsible for social media in their company (The CMO Survey, Mar 2026).
• More than 1 million businesses use Meta's AI business agents on WhatsApp and Messenger each week to talk to customers or complete sales (Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call, Jul 2026).
• TikTok (50%) and Facebook (46%) are the platforms consumers turn to first for customer service (vendor research) (Sprout Social, Sep 2026).
• 68% of consumers expect a brand to reply on social within 24 hours, and 14% expect a reply in under an hour (vendor research) (Sprout Social, Sep 2026).
• 27% of consumers plan to use social media more for customer service questions than last holiday season (vendor research) (Sprout Social, Sep 2026).

What risks and rules shape social media in 2026?

Worries about social media's effects are growing even though use is not falling, and governments are now acting on them. Age limits and transparency rules are the two fronts that will change how platforms operate.

Do people think social media is good for them?

Fewer than before. Teens and adults report real benefits, mostly staying close to friends, but a growing share say they use it too much.

• 45% of US teens say they spend too much time on social media, up from 36% in 2022 (Pew Research Center, Apr 2025).
• 74% of teens say social media makes them feel more connected to their friends (Pew Research Center, Apr 2025).
• Teen girls are more likely than boys to say social media has hurt their mental health, 25% against 14% (Pew Research Center, Apr 2025).
• Half of teen girls say social media has hurt their sleep, compared with 40% of boys (Pew Research Center, Apr 2025).
• Only 33% of UK adults feel the internet is good for society, down from 40% a year earlier (Ofcom, Online Nation 2025, Dec 2025).
• 26% of US consumers plan to spend less time on social media to avoid political content during election season (vendor research) (Sprout Social, Sep 2026).

Which new laws restrict social media?

Australia's under-16 ban and the EU's Digital Services Act now have enforcement behind them. In the US, the biggest change was TikTok's forced restructuring.

• Australia's social media minimum age took effect on 10 December 2025, and eSafety's focus has since moved to monitoring and enforcement (eSafety Commissioner, Jan 2026).
• The European Commission found X's paid blue checkmark to be deceptive design under the DSA, alongside failures on ad transparency and researcher data access (European Commission, Dec 2025).
• The Commission preliminarily found TikTok and Meta in breach of their DSA duty to give researchers adequate access to public data (European Commission, Oct 2025).
• TikTok's new US joint venture has three managing investors, Silver Lake, Oracle and MGX, holding 15% each (TikTok USDS Joint Venture, Jan 2026).

Methodology and Sources

We collected these figures in October 2026. Each number links to the organisation that produced it: platform earnings releases, earnings call transcripts and newsrooms, regulators, Pew Research Center, Ofcom, the Reuters Institute, IAB and PwC, The CMO Survey, and named vendor surveys from Sprout Social and Rival IQ, which we label as vendor research. DataReportal figures are attributed to the producer of the underlying data (GWI or Similarweb) where DataReportal reports someone else's research. Platform ad reach figures come from the platforms' own planning tools and can exceed real audiences. User identity counts are not unique people. Every URL was opened and the number checked on the page before publishing. This page is reviewed monthly and figures are replaced when a newer edition of a source is published.

Glossary

• DAP: daily active people, Meta's count of unique people who use at least one of its apps in a day.
• DAU / MAU: daily or monthly active users.
• ARPU: average revenue per user.
• DSA: the EU Digital Services Act, which sets transparency and safety duties for large online platforms.
• GWI: a market research company that runs a quarterly survey of internet users in more than 50 countries.
• Engagement rate: interactions (likes, comments, shares) divided by followers, as measured by Rival IQ.
• Unconnected post: a post in a user's Feed from an account they do not follow, chosen by the platform's recommendations.

Sources

• DataReportal, Global Social Media Statistics
• DataReportal, Digital 2026 Mid-Year Global Update Report
• DataReportal, Digital 2026 Global Overview Report
• Meta, Q2 2026 earnings call transcript
• Meta, New Features to Celebrate 500 Million Monthly Users on Threads
• Meta, Widely Viewed Content Report
• Snap Inc., Second Quarter 2026 Financial Results
• Pinterest, Second Quarter 2026 Results
• Reddit, Second Quarter 2026 Results (SEC filing)
• TikTok USDS Joint Venture, announcement
• Bluesky, Series B announcement
• Pew Research Center, Americans' Social Media Use 2025
• Pew Research Center, Teens, Social Media and AI Chatbots 2025
• Pew Research Center, Teens, Social Media and Mental Health
• Pew Research Center, Social Media and News Fact Sheet
• Pew Research Center, 1 in 5 Americans now regularly get news on TikTok
• Ofcom, Online Nation 2025
• Reuters Institute, Digital News Report 2026
• SparkToro, Search Happens Everywhere
• IAB and PwC, Internet Advertising Revenue Report: Full Year 2025
• The CMO Survey, Topline Report 2026
• Sprout Social, The State of Social Media 2026
• Rival IQ, 2026 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report
• eSafety Commissioner, Platforms restrict access to 4.7 million under-16 accounts
• European Commission, Commission fines X €120 million under the Digital Services Act
• European Commission, Commission preliminarily finds TikTok and Meta in breach of their transparency obligations