Top 10 Social Media Platforms

You can’t deny the fact that the introduction of social media has been a positive thing in the business world.

However, this is attributed to those who understand the value, uniqueness and functions of social media.

Whether you are a social media marketer or a business owner or even a random social media user who is looking to leverage on social media, it’s helpful to know the most important social media platforms and their statistics based on active users.

You should also have an understanding that it isn’t about the size of these platforms, but knowing if the platforms you are currently making use of is the right channel to reaching your target audience so as to allow effective reach and engagement on your posts, products and services.

Here are some of the most active social media platforms and their user statistics.

1. Facebook

2. YouTube

3. WhatsApp

4. Instagram

5. Tumblr

6. Twitter

7. Reddit

8. Snapchat

9. LinkedIn

10. Pinterest

1. Facebook

Facebook was established in 2004 and is the biggest social media site around, having over two billion monthly active users which is almost 2/3 of the world’s population. It has about 1.6 billion daily active users of which 88% are mobile users spending an average time of 58 minutes.

There are over 65 million businesses making use of Facebook Pages having more than 6 million active advertisers.

Facebook is easy to use because almost all content format work perfectly such as texts, images, videos, stories.

2. YouTube

This video-sharing platform was established in 2005 and is a site where users watch more than a billion hours if videos daily. It has about 1.9 billion monthly active users and daily active users of 149 million in which more than 5 billion video views are recorded daily. The average visit duration is 40 minutes.

In order to use YouTube for your brand or business, you should create a channel where you can upload videos for people to subscribe, view, like, comment and share.

Besides being the second biggest social media site, YouTube (owned by Google) is also often known as the second largest search engine after Google.

3. WhatsApp

WhatsApp is a messaging app used by over 1.5 billion users in over 180 countries of the world.

This app was initially introduced to reach out to family and friends but overtime, it became also became a business inclined platform, this has caused WhatsApp to introduce WhatsApp Business app for small businesses and for medium and large businesses, there is WhatsApp API.

WhatsApp has daily active users of 1 billion and over 60 billion messages are sent daily on this site and it was established in 2009.

4. Instagram

Instagram is a photo and video sharing social media app established in 2010. It supports the sharing of contents such as photos, videos, stories and live videos. It also has an IGTV for videos which are longer than the regular 1 minute videos.

Instagram records usage from over 1 billion active users monthly with over 600 million daily active users. Over 95 million posts are been recorded on a daily basis with over 500 million daily stories active users.

As a brand, you can have an Instagram business profile, which will provide you with rich analytics of your profile and posts.

5. Reddit

Reddit, also known as the front page of the Internet, is a platform where users can submit questions, links, and images, discuss them, and vote them up or down.

There are subreddits (i.e. dedicated forums) for pretty much anything under the sun (and above). Subreddits, however, have different levels of engagement so it’s great to research to see if there are popular subreddits that your brand can be part of.

It has about 330 million monthly active users with over 14 billion monthly views and over 138,000 active communities. It was established in 2005.

6. Twitter

Twitter is a social media site for news, entertainment, sports, politics, and more. What makes Twitter different from most other social media sites is that it has a strong emphasis on real-time information — things that are happening right now.

For example, one of the defining moments in the Twitter history is when Janis Krums tweeted the image of a plane that landed in the Hudson River when he was on the ferry to pick the passengers up.

Another unique characteristic of Twitter is that it only allows 280 characters in a tweet (140 for Japanese, Korean, and Chinese), unlike most social media sites that have a much higher limit.

It was established in 2006 and has over 330 million monthly active users. There are over 400,000 daily accounts been opened with 140 million tweets from users daily.

7. Snapchat

Snapchat is a social media app established in 2011. It focuses on sharing photos and short videos (as known as snaps) between friends. It made the Stories format popular, which eventually proliferated on other social media platforms like Instagram. But the rise of Instagram Stories seemed to have hindered Snapchat’s growth and marketers’ interest in using Snapchat for their brands in general.

Snapchat has over 301 million monthly users with a daily record of 109 million users. Over 10 billion daily video views from over 3 billion daily snaps.

8. LinkedIn

LinkedIn is now more than just a resume and job search site. It has evolved into a professional social media site where industry experts share content, network with one another, and build their personal brand. It has also become a place for businesses to establish their thought leadership and authority in their industry and attract talent to their company.

It was established in 2002 and has long been existing, having over 303 million monthly active users and over 30 million company pages are existing on the platform. The average visit duration on LinkedIn is 10 minutes.

9. Pinterest

Pinterest is a place where people go to discover new things and be inspired, quite unlike most social media sites where engagement is the primary focus. According to Pinterest, 78 percent of users say that content on Pinterest from brands are useful.

As Pinterest users want to be inspired to try or buy new things, having a presence on Pinterest could help put your brand on their minds.

It has 291 million monthly active users with a total of over 1 billion boards and 175 total pins created.

10. Tumblr

Tumblr is a microblogging and social networking site for sharing text, photos, links, videos, audios, and more. People share a wide range of things on Tumblr from cat photos to art to fashion.

On the surface, a Tumblr blog can look just like any other websites. So many blogs that you come across online might be using Tumblr!

It has about 452 total blogs with over 16 billion posts and 371 million monthly viewers.