7 in 10 Singaporeans use social media on mobile, double global average: survey

SEVENTY per cent of Singaporeans are active social media users on the go, more than double the global average of 34 per cent, according to a report on social media and digital trends around the world.

The report, "Digital in 2017", is a joint annual effort by Hootsuite, a platform for managing social media, and We Are Social, a social media agency. It compiles data from studies of online behaviour conducted by organisations including GlobalWebIndex, GSMA Intelligence, Statista, and Akamai.

The report also showed more than 3 in 4 Singaporeans now use social media, up 22 per cent from 2016, with 800,000 new users coming on board.

It helps that Singapore's average fixed internet connection speed is close to 3 times the global average, at 18.2 mbps compared to 6.3 mbps globally.

Globally, internet penetration increased by 10 per cent in the last 12 months to hit 3.773 billion, or 50 per cent of the world's population. Social media use has increased by 21 per cent, reaching 2.8 billion users. Mobile social media use has increased by 30 per cent year-over-year to surpass 2.5 billion users globally, with 91 per cent of social media users accessing social from mobile.

"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. The increase in internet users in developing economies is particularly encouraging," said Simon Kemp of We Are Social. "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."