Social media use reaches 5.66 billion people worldwide

Social media now reaches 5.66 billion people worldwide, putting it at the center of daily communication for more than two-thirds of the global population. The scale of use is drawing sharper attention from governments, especially over how long people spend on platforms and whether children should have access.

The latest DataReportal Digital 2026 Global Overview Report puts social media users at more than 68 percent of the world’s population. The figure marks a steep rise from fewer than 500 million users in 2005 and 2.27 billion in 2015, growth that DataReportal links to cheaper smartphones and wider internet access.

The annual spotlight on the sector comes around Social Media Day, which the digital media site Mashable established in 2010 to mark the role of social platforms in global communication. Sixteen years later, the services have moved far beyond messaging and sharing, becoming routine infrastructure for news, entertainment, commerce and public life.

Time spent online

DataReportal says the average active user spends 18 hours and 36 minutes each week on social media. That works out to about two hours and 39 minutes a day.

Over a full year, that average adds up to more than 40 full days on social platforms, according to DataReportal’s figures. The total does not reflect every user equally, but it shows how repeated daily use can become a large share of a person’s time.

Regional gaps remain wide

DataReportal says social media adoption is highest in East Asia, where users account for 88.1 percent of the total population. Northern Europe follows at 79 percent, with Western Europe at 77.7 percent and North America at 74 percent.

Usage is far lower in parts of Africa, according to the same report. Central Africa has the lowest rate listed, at 12.1 percent, followed by East Africa at 12.6 percent and West Africa at 19 percent.

Those gaps point to the uneven spread of internet access and connected devices. They also show that global user totals can mask large regional differences in who is online and how often platforms are used.

Largest platforms

Statista data compiled with Kepios ranks Facebook as the world’s largest social platform, with 3.07 billion monthly active users. The same data puts Instagram and WhatsApp, both owned by Meta, at 3 billion monthly active users each.

YouTube, owned by Google, has 2.58 billion monthly active users, according to Statista and Kepios. TikTok, which launched internationally in 2017, has an estimated 1.99 billion users, though the estimate varies by source.

Facebook has also made Reels the default format for video on the platform, according to the platform information cited with the ranking. The shift reflects the broader move toward short-form video across major social services.

Children’s access draws new restrictions

Lawmakers are increasingly focusing on children’s use of social media. The European Parliament has backed proposals for a minimum age of 16 for access and a ban on design features for younger users such as infinite scroll and autoplay, though no European Union-wide law is in force.

Several countries have acted on their own. Australia began enforcing a blanket ban on social media for children under 16 in December, becoming the first country to do so, Al Jazeera reported.

Indonesia banned social media for children under 16 in March, becoming the first Asian country to enforce such a rule, according to Al Jazeera. Brazil’s Digital Statute of Children and Adolescents, which took effect the same month, requires users under 16 to link accounts to a legal guardian and bans addictive features such as infinite scroll.

Turkiye passed a law in April restricting social media access for children under 15. In June, the United Kingdom’s government announced plans to ban under-16s from social media platforms, with restrictions expected to begin in spring 2027.

This story draws on original reporting from Al Jazeera.