Research shows decline in Facebook use among teens

American teens have collectively turned their backs on Facebook in recent years. The social medium is still used by about a third of teens, says Pew Research Center researcher. A similar study by the Pew Center showed that seven years ago, the rate was 71%.

TikTok is the most popular social network among teens. About two-thirds of American teens use it. Google’s video service YouTube is the most popular website among American teens. A whopping 95 percent use this site.

Facebook has been trying to keep in touch for years. In recent years, the social network in the United States, but also in Europe, has proven increasingly interesting for older users. Young people are more attracted to social networks with pictures and short videos, such as Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok.

Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook, regularly copies and presents the functionality of these services on Facebook and Instagram, which also belong to Meta. However, this sometimes leads to criticism from users of those services who do not want this. Additionally, it appears to have failed to retain younger users.

Meta’s bright spot is that Instagram is more popular with teens than Snapchat. Also, teens are now more likely to be sitting in the service than they were seven years ago during the previous survey.

Almost all American teens report having a smartphone. Nearly half of them report being online continuously, that was about seven years ago.