SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 29 — At a time when social media has never had so many active users — with some 4.2 billion of them worldwide — the Digital Report 2021 rounds up the reasons people use social networking sites. The top reasons driving people to Facebook and the like are to stay up to date with news and current events, and to find funny or entertaining content.

Top 10 reasons for using social media

1. Stay up to date with news and current events, 36.5%


2. Find funny or entertaining content, 35%


3. Fill up spare time, 34.4%


4. Stay in touch with what my friends are doing, 33%


5. Share photos or videos with others, 27.9%


6. Research products to buy, 27.5%


7. General networking with other people, 26.8%


8. Because a lot of my friends are on them, 25.1%


9. Share my opinion, 23.4%


10. Meet new people, 21.3%

The Digital Report 2021 is compiled by the We Are Social agency in collaboration with the social media management platform, Hootsuite. It features data from partner publications such as GlobalWebIndex, GSMA Intelligence, Statista, Locowise and SimilarWeb.— ETX Studio