Name: Social media use varies across 37 countries
Creator: Pew Research Center
Published: 2026-10-01
License: https://www.pewresearch.org/terms-and-conditions/

About this research

This Pew Research Center report looks at views of how social media has impacted democracy in 37 countries, as well as social media use by platform in each place.

Why did we do this?

Pew Research Center does research to help the public, media and decision-makers understand important topics. We study how people around the world feel about their democracies and the impact of social media and other emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI).

Learn more about Pew Research Center and our international surveys.

How did we do this?

We surveyed 42,151 people across 36 countries: Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, the Philippines, Poland, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Interviews were conducted from Feb. 8 to May 13, 2026. We designed the surveys so we could talk about the views of the adult population in each country.

For this report, data from the United States comes from two surveys. We surveyed 3,507 U.S. adults from March 23 to 29, 2026. Everyone who took part in this survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel. Additionally, we surveyed 5,511 U.S. adults from Jan. 30 to June 18, 2026 as part of the National Public Opinion Reference Survey (NPORS). These surveys represent the views of the full U.S. adult population.

Here are the survey questions used for this report, along with responses, and the survey methodology.

Social media platform use varies among people in 37 countries around the world. Facebook is generally the top platform of the five we asked about in a new Pew Research Center survey, followed by Instagram. Fewer overall use TikTok, X (formerly known as Twitter) or Snapchat.

Large majorities in most of these countries use at least one of these platforms, but multi-platform users (defined here as those who report using three or more of the five) tend to be more common in middle-income countries, as defined by World Bank lending groups.

These findings are part of a larger report on views of social media and its impact on democracy and individuals.

We asked people whether they use Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X and Snapchat. Across 37 countries, we find that:

Facebook is generally the top social media platform among these five. The shares who report using it are significantly higher than those that use the second-most common platform in more than half the countries surveyed.
In some countries, Instagram is equally or more popular than Facebook – especially in high-income nations in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region.
TikTok is among the top platforms in some middle-income Asian and African countries. (TikTok has been banned in India since 2020.)
Use of X and Snapchat is generally much lower than other platforms we asked about. However, about half the Japanese public uses X, and a similar share of Palestinians use Snapchat.

Which platforms are growing?

In 2023, we surveyed people about their use of social media platforms in eight middle-income countries: Argentina, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria and South Africa.

At the time, we asked about Facebook, Instagram, Telegram, TikTok, WhatsApp and X (then still called Twitter). This year, we did not ask about Telegram or WhatsApp, but added Snapchat.

In the U.S., we ask about a longer list of social media platforms annually.

Social media use has shifted in eight middle-income countries where we asked about these platforms in 2023.

Since the last time we asked this question globally, TikTok use is up considerably, Facebook and Instagram use are up somewhat and use of X has mostly stayed the same or decreased. We did not ask about Snapchat in 2023.

TikTok use has increased by double digits in almost every country where trends are available. For example, in Nigeria, the share of TikTok users has more than doubled from 25% in 2023 to 57% today.

Instagram use has also increased in six of the eight countries where we last asked the question – including double-digit increases of 17 percentage points in Nigeria, 15 points in Argentina, 14 points in Indonesia and 12 points in India.

Similarly, the shares that report using Facebook have grown in Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria and South Africa.

Unlike the other platforms we asked about, use of X has stayed the same or decreased in most of the countries where trend data is available. For example, in Brazil, just 7% report using X – down from 22% in 2023. But in Indonesia and Nigeria, the shares that use X have grown.

Who uses Facebook, Instagram, X, TikTok and Snapchat?

Broadly, younger people and more educated people are more likely to use each of the platforms we asked about, with a few exceptions.

In high-income countries, Facebook tends to be most popular among those ages 35 to 49. But in middle-income countries, Facebook is most popular among younger people, those 18 to 34.

In 36 of the 37 countries surveyed, younger adults are more likely to use Instagram than older adults. And those with more education are also more likely to use Instagram than those with less education.

TikTok use is also much more prevalent among younger people than older people virtually everywhere we polled. In several places, young adults are about 50 percentage points more likely to use TikTok than people ages 5o and older.

While people with more education are generally more likely to use TikTok than those with less education, this pattern is reversed in some high-income countries.

As with the other social media platforms, younger people and more highly educated people are more likely than their counterparts to say they use X.

Snapchat is dominated by younger adults in most places, and in several countries, it is almost exclusively used by the youngest demographic. For instance, in the U.K., the majority of those ages 18 to 34 use Snapchat (58%) compared to only 2% of those 50 and older.

As with TikTok, Snapchat use is more common among those with more education in middle income countries like Ghana, Pakistan and Peru – but in high-income countries like Canada, France and the Netherlands, people with less education are more likely to use it.

Majorities in most surveyed countries report using at least one of the social media platforms asked about, but there is significant variation in the number of platforms they use.

Broadly, the shares of multi-platform users – those who use three or more of the five social media platforms on our list – tend to be larger in middle-income nations than in high-income countries.

Half or more in Malaysia, Singapore, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, Chile, Peru and Colombia say they use at least three of these platforms.

Non-users are most likely to be found in Germany, Japan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, India and Bangladesh. At least one-third in each of these countries say they don’t use any of the social media platforms asked about.

Some of the places with the biggest shares of non-users are countries where specific platforms are restricted (like TikTok in India) or people experience internet and social media blackouts during periods of unrest.

When it comes to social media platform use, there are differences by age. In every country surveyed, adults under age 35 are the most likely to use three or more platforms of the five we asked about, while those 50 and older are the least likely to report using multiple platforms. The oldest adults in nearly all countries are more likely to say they don’t use any social media platforms.

And in many places, those with more education are at least twice as likely as those with less education to use three or more platforms – except in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden, where those who are more educated are less likely to use multiple platforms.

In a few countries, those on the ideological left are more likely to use at least three platforms compared to those on the right. For instance, roughly half of Turks on the left are self-reported multi-platform users – nearly double the share of Turks on the right who say the same. We see a similar pattern in Australia, Colombia, Israel and Thailand.

	Ages 18-34	18-34	35-49	50+	Youngest-oldest diff
Indonesia	88	88	74	29	+59
Sri Lanka	78	78	62	22	+56
Bangladesh	67	67	32	12	+55
Thailand	98	98	92	45	+53
South Africa	87	87	73	34	+53
India	65	65	37	16	+49
Kenya	78	78	55	36	+42
Ghana	72	72	59	31	+41
Mexico	96	96	87	56	+40
South Korea	79	79	70	40	+39
Philippines	99	99	90	63	+36
Colombia	91	91	89	62	+29
Chile	93	93	93	65	+28
Poland	86	86	85	59	+27
Hungary	93	93	88	67	+26
Peru	97	97	89	73	+24
Pakistan	59	59	47	35	+24
Greece	83	83	84	60	+23
W. Bank/E. Jerusalem	93	93	92	74	+19
Argentina	86	86	85	67	+19
Japan	47	47	67	30	+17
France	62	62	69	48	+14
Israel	75	75	77	67	+8
Brazil	62	62	71	54	+8
U.K.	59	59	74	51	+8
Australia	84	84	84	77	+7
U.S.	72	72	78	65	+7
Sweden	73	73	86	67	+6
Malaysia	82	82	90	77	+5
Netherlands	44	44	58	48	-4
Turkey	54	54	66	60	-6
Germany	26	26	50	32	-6
Canada	57	57	84	66	-9
Italy	55	55	70	68	-13
Spain	46	46	66	59	-13
Singapore	62	62	87	80	-18

Topics

Regions & Countries

Formats

Across the Globe, People Increasingly Say Social Media Is Harming Democracy

Social Media Platform Use Around the World

Why did we do this?

How did we do this?

Which platforms are growing?

Who uses Facebook, Instagram, X, TikTok and Snapchat?

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Country	Facebook	Instagram	TikTok	X	Snapchat	Grouping
U.S.	70	51	37	18	26	North America
Canada	68	46	26	18	19	North America
France	56	48	28	12	31	Europe
Germany	35	45	17	10	12	Europe
Greece	70	55	37	13	6	Europe
Hungary	78	37	37	10	9	Europe
Italy	65	60	33	12	6	Europe
Netherlands	49	47	24	12	19	Europe
Poland	73	45	35	18	13	Europe
Spain	57	61	40	25	7	Europe
Sweden	73	67	22	13	35	Europe
U.K.	58	52	33	22	20	Europe
Australia	81	59	27	19	24	Asia-Pacific
Bangladesh	42	8	25	2	7	Asia-Pacific
India	43	38	6	7	18	Asia-Pacific
Indonesia	67	45	62	15	8	Asia-Pacific
Japan	42	55	37	51	6	Asia-Pacific
Malaysia	83	62	81	30	14	Asia-Pacific
Pakistan	51	17	52	6	28	Asia-Pacific
Philippines	86	40	58	19	22	Asia-Pacific
Singapore	76	72	61	26	12	Asia-Pacific
South Korea	56	52	35	28	5	Asia-Pacific
Sri Lanka	54	19	35	7	16	Asia-Pacific
Thailand	70	32	68	20	6	Asia-Pacific
Israel	72	58	47	26	14	Middle East
Turkey	60	75	30	35	12	Middle East
W. Bank/E. Jerusalem	88	64	72	14	50	Middle East
Ghana	61	26	65	16	41	Africa
Kenya	64	28	58	16	28	Africa
Nigeria	72	40	57	26	34	Africa
South Africa	69	28	59	14	22	Africa
Argentina	79	69	55	22	13	Latin America
Brazil	62	67	51	7	6	Latin America
Chile	81	65	66	30	18	Latin America
Colombia	80	54	66	22	20	Latin America
Mexico	81	50	62	24	25	Latin America
Peru	87	51	72	23	24	Latin America
37-country median	69	51	40	18	18	Median

	Facebook	Instagram	TikTok	Snapchat	X	Groupings
Total	69	51	40	18	18	Total
18-34	78	77	64	35	29	age
35-49	74	57	44	12	16	age
50+	59	29	26	4	9	age

Across the Globe, People Increasingly Say Social Media Is Harming Democracy

Social Media Platform Use Around the World

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