Where in the world do people use social media the most?

In 2020, there will be 23.8 million Facebook users in Nigeria, 40.5 million in Egypt, and 18.7 million in South Africa. But those figures represent a very small percentage of the population in each country—11.1% in Nigeria, 38.9% in Egypt, and 33.2% in South Africa. Key Takeaways. Facebook’s user growth rate will nearly double in 2020 due to the pandemic. It will add 153.0 million worldwide users.

Nigeria, Egypt, and South Africa will see the most rapid increases in social network use in 2020. South Africa also ranked in the top three in our November 2019 forecast. China and Russia are unique markets—but crucial to understanding the global picture. China is home to the largest population of social network users worldwide, at almost 890 million in 2020.

In South Africa, for example, the share of internet users who’d read a print newspaper in the month prior to polling fell almost 10 percentage points, and magazine penetration plunged 17 percentage points. Significant drops were also seen in Colombia, Hong Kong, and Romania, among others. There’s no doubt that the pandemic is further complicating an already complex picture.

TikTok is also making moves in Africa, where it opened a local office in Nairobi, Kenya, in January and has been courting influencers in South Africa and Nigeria, among other countries. Africa’s social network users are very young and mobile-centric, making them a good target for TikTok.

In an April 22-27 survey conducted by GlobalWebIndex, for example, 45% of internet users worldwide said they were spending more time with messaging services like WhatsApp and Messenger because of the pandemic, with that figure reaching more than half in India (57%), South Africa (57%), Brazil (56%), Spain (54%), Italy (51%), and the Philippines (51%).