Marketing intelligence firm SimilarWeb is behind the data, which pinpoints time on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat from January to March and covers users located in U.S., India, South Africa, UK, Spain, Germany, Australia, Brazil, and Spain. Overall social media app usage was down the most on the Facebook-owned Instagram and down the least on Facebook itself: Instagram: Down 23.7 percent Twitter: Down 23.4 percent Snapchat: Down 15.7 percent Facebook: Down 8 percent The news aligns with data from tech analyst Mary Meeker’s recent report: Growth is slowly dramatically across many aspects of tech and media, not just social media app engagement. Emily Bell, director of Tow Centre for Digital Journalism at Columbia Journalism School, best broke down the new information in a recent article for The Guardian: Bell’s ominous conclusion to the analysis: “There is a ceiling on growth of people, of the devices they buy, the places they spend their time and the money they spend. And there is a ceiling on the number of companies enjoying what’s left of the growth.” With growth slowing, platforms and media publishers will be increasingly focused on consolidating and determining what revenue model can support them.
