• The network of goal loses relevance as a news medium in the last decade: its use drops from 53% in 2014 to 25% in 2024.

• TikTok is gaining ground among young people: 23% of those under 35 use it for news, compared to 8% of those over that age. 

The majority of social networks are experiencing a drop in their overall use, in a trend of sustained decline over the last two years. Although there are elements that emerge when analyzing data by groups, there is a generalized decline in the use of almost all social networks. The only one that has increased when analyzing the global data for Spain is LinkedIn, albeit only marginally, from 12% to 13%.

The status changes when examining the use of social networks as sources of information. Here
a greater diversity of trends can be observed. Among those that have seen their use increase are YouTube, up one percentage point to 22%, LinkedIn, up another percentage point to 4%, and TikTok, up another point to 11%. It is important to note that while TikTok experienced significant growth last year by doubling its presence as an informative source (going from 5% to 10%), in the last year its increase has moderated, rising only one percentage point from 2023 to 2024. It now remains to be determined whether this increase marks a stabilization point or whether the platform will continue its ascent in the near future.

Apart from the particular increases and decreases, in the general panorama of social networks in Spain, the continued dominance of WhatsApp as the social network most used by those surveyed stands out as network . Some 75% of Spaniards say they use it regularly. This platform has managed to increase its distance with respect to the second most popular social network , YouTube, which is used by 58% of those surveyed. Although both networks are on a downward trend, WhatsApp is declining less sharply than YouTube, allowing it to maintain its dominant position.

Among the social networks most consumed by Spaniards are also Instagram (52%), Facebook (52%) and TikTok (26%). These data, in some cases, exceed average of use compared to other countries included in the study. This is B the case of TikTok or Instagram, whose use in Spain is three and ten percentage points higher than average, respectively. However, it is WhatsApp that stands out most significantly, with usage fourteen percentage points higher in Spain (75%) than in the rest of the countries surveyed. In fact, the high use of WhatsApp in Spain is only surpassed in Europe by Italy, where it is used by 78% of respondents. 

Informative use of social networks

The change in the information landscape is striking. WhatsApp, in addition to being the most used social network by Spaniards, is also the main social network in terms of information. Some 27% of Spaniards say they use it to enter contact with news or to share them, a percentage that is higher than Facebook (26%) for the first time since the series began in 2014. This is because Facebook continues in its progressive collapse in informative matter. If ten years ago the social network of goal was listed as source news for 53% of Spanish respondents, today its percentage is half of what it was then. This fall seems to have accelerated since 2019, a year in which it still reached 47% among Spaniards.

The third most used social network to access contact with news is YouTube (22%). Both in this case and in that of Facebook, the differences with respect to the average of the rest of the countries in the study are notable and statistically significant. While the average use of Facebook in the rest of the countries analyzed stands at 61%, in Spain it is only 52%. In the case of YouTube, the difference is smaller. Some 61% of those surveyed globally say they use it at some point during the week, while among Spaniards this percentage drops to 58%. Thus, Spain is in the bottom half of the overall table for Facebook and YouTube.

With regard to the informative use of social networks, statistically significant differences were found in five social networks: Facebook, Facebook Messenger, TikTok, YouTube and X. The general trend outside Spain is a greater informative use of social networks, as is the case with Facebook or YouTube, where the average of respondents who say they use them as an informative source is much higher than in Spain (9 percentage points in both cases). 

The only social network that differs from this trend is X, which is used more for information purposes in Spain (16%) than abroad (10%). Among European countries, Spain is the one that makes the most informative use of this social network . Both in general use (25%) and in relation to news (16%), this social network is more popular among Spaniards than it is at a general level in the other countries surveyed. Both in general use and in relation to news, Spain is the European country where it is most used.

In addition to the social networks selected in the graph, another striking aspect of 2024 is the percentage of Spaniards who say they get information through other social networks not included in the study. The figure shown on report for Spain (21%) is in line with the global figure and practically coincides with the percentage obtained by this category in recent years. However, it is worth noting that one fifth of those surveyed ticked this option.

Finally, greater consumption of social networks is observed among those with a higher Education , with statistically significant differences between the different educational groups. This suggests that Education plays an important role in the choice and use of social networks as information source .

 
When distinguishing by gender, statistically significant differences are observed in three social networks: YouTube and X, where there is a clear preeminence of men, and Instagram, where women are in the majority. In the case of YouTube and Instagram the values are practically reversed. Men take thirteen percentage points (29% to 16%) out of women in the use of YouTube as source for information. Women, on the other hand, do the same, although with a distance of nine points difference, in the case of Instagram, where 25% of women say they use the social network as source for information, while among men the percentage drops to 16%.

With regard to age, there are statistically significant differences in six of the seven categories selected. In WhatsApp and Facebook, the distances of eight percentage points and eighteen percentage points, respectively, that those over 35 have over those under 35 are statistically significant. The same is true for the "none of these" category, where those over 35 years of age mark a distance of nine points. For their part, in those social networks most used by those under 35 to enter in relation to news (Instagram, Twitter and TikTok), the differences are also significant. The case of Twitter and TikTok are particularly striking, since the percentages of under-35s who say they use them to get information, 28% and 23% respectively, are fifteen points higher than those over 35.

Age has a determining influence on the consumption of social networks for information purposes. From this approach, significant differences are found in the use that respondents make of five of the main social networks. Specifically, those under 35 years of age lean towards Instagram (29%), X (28%) and TikTok (23%) for information, while those over 35 bet on Facebook (30%), WhatsApp and, to a lesser extent, YouTube (23%). There is a complete dissonance between the two groups. The three social networks most used by young people for information are, in turn, the ones least used by those over 35 and vice versa.

Finally, when distinguishing between those who are interested in current affairs and those who are not,
significant differences are observed in the six most used social networks, a difference that reaches twenty percentage points in some cases. The disparity is especially B when comparing group between those who are interested in information and those who are not.

The analysis of social networks grouped by type reveals a predominance of the goal conglomerate in almost all the groups analyzed. Both in the total number of respondents and when differentiating between those interested in current affairs and those who are not, the percentage of users who report using social networks linked to Facebook is in the majority. In some cases, such as among respondents interested in current affairs, this percentage reaches 60%, underlining the significant influence of platforms associated with goal in accessing and interacting with news.

The only group where the group of goal does not demonstrate this superiority is among young people under 35 years of age. The respondents of this group, when asked about the social networks they used to consume news content and interact with it, choose social networks that respond to an image-based language (Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok or Twitch) rather than social networks linked to Facebook (Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, etc.). In other words, the social networks where they interact with the news are image-related, that is what prevails.

Among respondents aged 18 to 24, consumption of TikTok and Instagram for information is notably higher compared to other age groups, with an increase of up to twenty percentage points. Among those respondents aged 18-24, 30% say they consume news through this social network , a percentage that drops to 18% among respondents aged 25-34. In the following age groups, the use of TikTok as a source of information source does not exceed 10%. The gap in these percentages increases even more when looking at the consumption of this social network in general, where 50% of young people between the ages of 18 and 24 say they use it.

Sources of attention in social networks

As a general rule, Spaniards are more inclined to use profiles of journalistic brands and ordinary people rather than politicians or celebrities when it comes to finding information on social networks. This is a difference between Spain and other countries surveyed, where the relevance of politicians and celebrities is greater. Thus, compared to average in the rest of the countries, Spaniards report following more issue journalistic brands, both conventional and secondary, as well as journalists, rather than celebrities, whether traditional or digital influencers .

The differences between the sources followed by Spaniards and the average of these same sources in other countries reach ten percentage points. In some cases, such as the profiles of politicians on X or celebrities on TikTok, the differences between Spain and the rest of the countries reach thirteen and fifteen percentage points, respectively. In contrast, Spaniards report following many more journalistic sources on TikTok than respondents report overall.

Thus, information sources on social networks in Spain are governed by a marked bipolarity between ordinary people, the majority on Facebook (43%) and TikTok (46%), and the information profiles of conventional journalistic brands, which have higher percentages on X (55%) or YouTube (40%).