Digital 2023 July Global Statshot Report

Team Locowise posted on 20 July 2023

Locowise is a proud data partner of the Global Digital Reports, published by Datareportal in partnership with We Are Social and Meltwater.

With 350 slides and 10,000 words of analysis, this latest report within the series is an essential source of insight into digital usage worldwide.

Discover trends and insights to support your understanding and improve your strategy.

Top headlines in the July 2023 report from Datareportal:

The population 

Data from the United Nations shows that the world’s population reached 8.05 billion by the start of July 2023. The population grew by 70 million over the past 12 months.

Data from the United Nations shows that India has now “officially” overtaken China to become the world’s most populous nation. India’s population is growing at an annual rate of just over 0.8%, while China’s population is shrinking at a rate of 0.02% per year. Together, these two nations account for more than 35% of the world’s total population in July 2023, meaning that more than 1 in 3 people on Earth call one of these 2 countries home.

Digital usage 

The number of people using the internet has grown by 2.1% over the past year to reach 5.19 billion in July 2023. This figure equates to 64.5% of the world’s population, although delays in reporting mean that actual internet penetration is likely higher than these figures suggest.

Kepios’s analysis shows that the global social media adoption rate has doubled in the past 8 years. The number of active social media user identities now equates to 60.6% of the world’s population, with the global total reaching 4.88 billion in July 2023. Social media adoption increased by 3.7% since this time last year, thanks to the addition of 173 million new active identities. However, this figure will include several duplicate and false accounts. 

The time people spend using the internet increased by an average of five minutes per day during the past three months (+1.3%) to reach a worldwide average of 6 hours and 40 minutes per day. 

The amount of time people spend using social media increased by two minutes per day (+1.4%) to reach 2 hours and 26 minutes daily.

The latest data reveals that OpenAI is now one of the 20 most visited sites on the web. Analysis from Similarweb ranked openai.com 17th in the world based on global traffic in May 2023, while Semrush ranked the site 19th for the same period. More specifically, Similarweb reports that OpenAI’s website attracted 295 million unique visitors in May for a total of 1.86 billion visits. However, the report suggests that the site’s worldwide traffic dropped by 9.7% in June 2023 compared with the previous month, while unique visitors were down 5.7% month-on-month.

Interests 

Overall, less than half of all online adults are interested in news. The RISJ’s 2023 study reveals that barely 1 in 3 people aged 18 to 24 are interested in the news today – regardless of delivery channel or news brand – compared with more than half of adults aged 55 and above.

At a worldwide level (excluding China and Russia), just 4 in 10 respondents to the RISJ survey said that they trust news content overall. The data for this show marked differences by geography, from a high of 69% in Finland to just 19% in Greece.

“Finding information” remains the primary motivation for going online at a global level, with roughly 6 in 10 people between the ages of 16 and 64 saying that this is one of the main reasons why they use the internet.

GWI’s latest wave of research reveals that social media has overtaken word-of-mouth recommendations when introducing people to new brands, products, and services.

Word of mouth remains more important amongst older age groups though, especially in comparison with social media ads.

Amongst internet users aged 55 to 64, TV ads are still the primary source of brand discovery, ahead of search engines.

Social media ads are now the third most significant source of discovery behind search engines and ads on TV, with 27.7% of working-age internet users saying that they discover brands via paid placements on social platforms. Social media ads are particularly important when marketing to younger people, with GWI reporting that this channel is the top source of new brand discovery for internet users aged 16 to 24.

The final Statshot report of 2023 will be released in late October. This report will also take a look ahead at the trends expected to define success in 2024 and beyond.