Half the world is now online

Internet penetration increased by 10% in the last 12 months to hit 3.773 billion, or 50% of the world’s population, according to a report from social media management platform Hootsuite and social media agency We Are Social.

The report also showed that global social media use has increased by 21% in the last 12 months, reaching 2.8 billion users globally.

Another finding is that mobile social media use has increased by 30% year-over-year to surpass 2.5 billion users globally, with 91% of social media users accessing social from mobile.

In APAC, mobile data traffic leads significantly over other regions, with 4.12 billion gigabytes consumed, compared with 1.24 gigabytes from North Europe, Middle East, and Africa.

Social media growth rates increased by over 50% year-on-year. More than 1.5 billion people across APAC now use social media on a monthly basis, 95% of whom access social via mobile devices – the highest ratio in the world.

As a result, organizations in APAC should plan to transform their communications strategy to increase customer engagement and real-time interaction across the customer journey.

“Half of the world’s population is now online, which is a testament to the speed with which digital connectivity is helping to improve people’s lives,” We Are Social’s Simon Kemp said.

“Given this latest data, it’s probably time for us to stop referring to social as ‘new media’, and integrate it more seamlessly into our day-to-day activities.”

The report compiles data from the world’s largest studies of online behavior, conducted by organizations including GlobalWebIndex, GSMA Intelligence, Statista, and Akamai.