The 2018 Global Digital Report data describes impressive growth trends in internet access, mobile penetration and social platforms subscriptions
The Annual Report published online by WeAreSocial and HootSuite is nowadays a must for those willing to have an insight on comprehensive datas about Internet access, mobile and social diffusion, and more generally all aspects related to the digital revolution.
The Report is drafted in collaboration with data collecting partners like GlobalWebIndex, GSMA Intelligence, Statista, Locowise and SimilarWeb, presenting every year detailed visual maps showing digital trends throughout the world.
This document, articulated in thematic sections and country fiches, describes a more digitally integrated world, where developed countries have almost reached the saturation point in terms of Internet penetration and speed as well as mobile diffusion.
Now over the half of world’s population has internet access, with the latest data showing that nearly a quarter of a billion new users came online for the first time in 2017: almost one new user every 11 seconds and a constant +20% trend in Africa every year.
Among the most interesting trends there are probably those showing the impressive number of new mobile users in developing countries and social media subscriptions in Central (+90%) and Southern Asia (+33%)
Today the two thirds of the world’s population owns a smartphone and this device is becoming the principal Internet access tool in many countries; as an example, the 95% of the share of facebook use is made through a mobile device like a smartphone or a tablet.
The smartphone diffusion is the key driver of Internet penetration in developing countries, allowing people to have a cheap and easy tool to interact with others and collect information.
Mobile connectivity, in this sense, is fostered by infrastructure investments that have led to a 60 percent of mobile connections that can now be classified as broadband, even if there is a great variety in mobile connection speeds between countries, even developed ones.
The extension of Internet accessibility is not only increasing in geographical, but also in anagraphical terms: the number of facebook subscriptions of over 65 aged people exceeds four times those of teenager between 13 and 17. However, there still remains a huge female underrepresentation in central Africa, the Middle East and Southern Asia.
Despite being room for improvement, the encouraging growth percentages represent a positive tendency towards a future where all people in the world from every social background will have access to information and knowledge as well as not-to-be-missed business opportunities for companies like Google, Alibaba, Facebook and Tencent.