50 Facebook Statistics You Should Know in 2024

With a plethora of thriving social media platforms to choose from, deciding which social platform is best for your brand can be tricky. Ever since Mark Zuckerberg and his Harvard University peers founded Facebook in 2004, it has become the largest social network on the planet. As such, Facebook can be a great place for brands to connect with consumers and promote their products or services.

Still not convinced? No problem! Let’s dive into exactly why Facebook should be considered in your social media strategy with some impressive stats and facts.

The platform was founded by Mark Zuckerberg and his fellow Harvard University peers, Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes, in 2004.

The idea behind Facebook originated from Facemash, an online platform for Harvard University students to judge the attractiveness of other students. It was quickly shut down after only two days for violating university policy. There was a silver lining though – the invention of Facebook!

Previously, the platform had been exclusive to high school and university students in the US. In 2005, Facebook was made available to students outside of the US, propelling the platform’s monthly active users from one million to six million by the end of 2005.

In September 2006, Facebook finally opened their doors to everyone aged 13 and older with a valid email address.

With the introduction of the News Feed, the ability to tag others in photos, and the ability for companies to advertise, Facebook finally surpassed Myspace in popularity.

The most recent figures from Statista (Q4 2023) show that Facebook has 3.065 billion monthly active users, making it the largest social network in the world.

According to recent Statista data (January 2024), 56.5% of global Facebook users are male.

Millennials (those between the ages of 25 and 44) make up 51.1% of all Facebook users, making them the most active age group on the platform.

While the younger generation is less likely to be active on Facebook, 18-24-year-olds still make up 23.2% of all Facebook users.

Despite being a favourite among American teens, only 33% of teens today use Facebook compared to 71% in 2014-2015.

Teens in lower-income households use Facebook more often than teens in higher-income households.

The country with the most Facebook users is India with over 385.65 million active users, followed by the US (188.6 million) and Indonesia (136.35 million).

With around 67.9 million people living in the UK, more than half of the entire population uses Facebook.

The average Facebook Page has an average engagement rate of just 0.07%.

Image posts have the highest engagement rate at 0.12%, followed by video posts at 0.08% and status posts at 0.06%.

When interacting with Facebook and Instagram, users spend 50% of their time watching videos.

74% of those who watch videos on Facebook do so without sound.

Live videos receive 3x the median interactions compared to carousels.

According to Facebook, more than two billion people watch in-stream-eligible videos on Facebook each month.

74% of Facebook in-stream non-skippable video ad views are completed across the globe.

On average, square videos receive 35% more views than landscape videos.

On average, users spend almost 20 hours a month on Facebook, which averages out to 40 minutes per day.

Mobile-only users represent 81.8% of all Facebook users, while only 1.5% exclusively use their laptop or desktop to access Facebook.

Specifically, 57.53% of the world’s active internet users access Facebook every month.

In terms of engagement days and times, weekdays from 10 am to 1 pm are the most popular for Facebook users.

More specifically, Wednesday at 9 am and 1 pm is the best time to post on Facebook.

Facebook posts before 5 am and after 8 pm on weekends receive the least engagement.

54% of all Facebook users engage with the platform to follow and research brands and products.

Almost nine in ten (89%) of social media marketers use Facebook to promote their business, while 80% use Instagram.

Over 10 million advertisers actively utilise Facebook’s ad services and tools.

Meta’s planning tools indicate that Facebook ads can reach 1.983 billion users each month.

More than nine in ten (91%) businesses have a presence on Facebook.

The top five performing industries by Facebook ad clickthrough rate include Arts & Entertainment, Real Estate, Restaurants & Food, Travel, and Collectibles & Gifts.

Facebook ads garner an average CTR of 2.50% across all industries.

On average, the CPC in Facebook ads for traffic campaigns across all industries is $0.83. This is much lower than the average CPC in Google Ads of $4.22.

The average conversion rate on Facebook is 8.25% across all industries.

With low CPC and high conversion rates, Facebook yields high returns, so much so that it generates the highest ROI, tied only with Instagram at 29%.

58% of Facebook users visit a brand’s website to find out more information after seeing a brand’s product or service in a Facebook Story.

31% of Facebook users physically visit a brand’s store after seeing their Story.

19% of US consumers turn to Facebook before beginning their shopping spree.

More than 1 billion messages are sent between people and businesses on Facebook Messenger each month.

77% of marketers retarget Facebook and Instagram ads to increase their reach.

With 3.065 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the most popular social media platform followed by YouTube with 2.504 billion users and Instagram with 2 billion users.

Only 19% of teens use Facebook daily, decreasing to just 3% of 13-17-year-olds. On the other end of the scale, 71% of teenagers visit YouTube daily and 58% use TikTok every day.

Out of all social media platforms, teens visit YouTube most often, followed by TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook.

Social media users spend the most amount of time on TikTok, at around 23.3 hours per month. YouTube users spend 23 hours per month engaging with the app, while Facebook users spend 20 hours per month on the platform.

Native Facebook videos have 10 times more reach than YouTube links.

Facebook videos have an engagement rate of 0.22% compared to 0.10% for YouTube links.

63.5 million people made at least one purchase via Facebook in 2022. Instagram is the second platform for social commerce with 41 million people making purchases, followed by TikTok with 23.7 million purchases and Pinterest with 15.9 million purchases.

In 2023, Facebook generated around $152 billion (USD) in global revenue from advertising. Facebook is predicted to generate  $170.82 billion in advertising revenue in 2024.

To make accurate predictions, let’s take a look at the most significant trends. With people increasingly engaging and interacting with videos, and more specifically live videos, Facebook will likely introduce and incorporate more video-led content in the newsfeed and beyond. With teens choosing YouTube as their platform of choice, we could also see Facebook pushing long-form videos to engage different audiences. TikTok is already testing 30-minute uploads and pushing longer videos, seemingly taking inspiration from YouTube.

The stats don’t lie. Facebook is the most popular platform on the planet, making it a vital space for brands and advertisers. As we can see, the majority of Facebook users are male millennials, however, a high number of teens still interact with the platform. Users are most likely to engage with image-based posts yet spend half their time watching videos – with the sound off! Live video is another feature that brands should leverage, from Q&As to behind-the-scenes.

Need some help with your Facebook marketing strategy? Drop us a line!