According to the Global State Of Digital In 2019 report by Hootsuite, South African’s spend among the most time online of any country, with an average of nearly 8.5 hours a day spent online, compared to a bit over 6.5 hours a day for US users.
This is despite the fact that we still have a below average internet penetration, with only 54% of our population connected to the internet, compared to a global average of 57%, and a US penetration of 95%.
Cell Phone Usage
We also have a higher than average amount of time spent online via mobile devices, averaging around 3.5 hours a day spent online with a phone is SA, 16 minutes more than the global average of 3 hours and 14 minutes.
Social Media Usage
The report also reveals that around 40% of South African internet users have active social media accounts, led by WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned messaging app that is SA’s most active media platform, with 90% of internet making use of the platform, followed by YouTube with 84%, Facebook at 82%, and Instagram at 54%. Twitter was accessed by 42% of internet users in SA, and LinkedIN at 38%.
Twitter usage in SA has dropped by 27% (I wonder if the elimination of fake / bot accounts contributed to this), while both Facebook and Instagram usage saw a 4% increase, and 48% of South African internet users stream content.
First Time Decline
After 5 years of continuous increase, the global average time spent daily online decreased by 1.7%.