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December 27, 2023

Adcore Marketing Team

17 Most Popular Social Media Platforms

Content Marketing Marketing Social Media

Humans are social. It’s no wonder that we have harnessed the power of technology to progress our natural social inclinations with social media.

Some social media platforms come in and out of the spotlight; others are here to stay. Let’s look at the most popular social media platforms.

1. Facebook (Meta)

Facebook wasn’t the first social media platform but the first to gain widespread popularity. Facebook has 2.91 billion active users monthly; 72% are active daily. On average, users spend roughly 33 minutes a day on Facebook.

Monthly Active Users: 2.91 billion
Revenue: $117.9 billion (2021)
Headquarters: Menlo Park, California
Launch Date: February 4th, 2004
Founders: Mark Zuckerberg, Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, Chris Hughes

2. YouTube

YouTube is an online video-sharing social media platform launched in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is the second most visited website in the world and has 14.3 billion monthly visits.

YouTube has 2.6 billion active monthly users. The top reasons users come to YouTube or for entertainment or education.

Monthly Active Users: 2.6 billion
Revenue: $28.8 billion (2021)
Headquarters: San Bruno, California
Launch Date: February 14th, 2005
Founders: Chad Hurley, Steven Chen, Jawed Karim

3. WhatsApp

WhatsApp is an internationally available instant messaging and voice-over-IP platform. What’s up allows users to send text messages, voice messages, video calls, images, documents, locations, and videos. WhatsApp has 2 billion active users monthly and is projected to reach 3 billion by 2027.

WhatsApp makes money through its business app and WhatsApp pay, a service similar to PayPal. In 2021 WhatsApp brought in annual revenue of $8.7 billion.

Monthly Active Users: 2 billion
Revenue: $8.7 billion
Headquarters: Menlo Park, California
Launch Date: January 2009
Founders: Jan Koum, Brian Acton

4. Instagram

Instagram is a photo and video-sharing social media platform founded in 2010 by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger. The app allows users to upload pictures, organized with hashtags, tagging geographic as well as short-form and long-form video content and stories. Instagram has 1.22 billion monthly users, most between the ages of 16 to 34.

Monthly Active Users: 1.22 Billion
Revenue: $47.6 billion
Headquarters: Menlo Park, California
Launch Date: October 6th, 2010
Founders: Kevin Systrom, Mike Kreiger

5. WeChat/Wexin

WeChat is a Chinese instant messaging social media and mobile payment app developed by Tencent Holdings in 2011. It’s known as China’s app for everything and holds the title of the world’s largest standalone mobile app since 2018.

Monthly Active Users: 1.2 billion
Revenue: $5.5 billion
Headquarters: Shenzhou, Guangdong
Launch Date: January 21st, 2011
Founders: Tencent Holdings Limited

6. TikTok

Tiktok is a short-form video hosting platform owned by ByteDance, a Chinese internet technology company. The platform has been on the market since 2016, but it skyrocketed in popularity in 2020 during the covid-19 pandemic. In 2021, TikTok surpassed Google as the most popular website on the internet.

Monthly Active Users: 1 billion
Revenue: $4.6 billion (2021, with Douyin)
Headquarters: Beijing, China
Launch Date: September 2016
Founders: Zhang Yiming

7. Facebook Messenger

Facebook Messenger is an instant messaging social platform created by Meta Platforms, creator of Facebook and owner of WhatsApp and Instagram. Though developed as a Facebook Chat in 2008, it was later revamped into a social platform in 2011. It currently makes no revenue for Meta but does serve as a draw for new users.

Monthly Active Users: $999.8 million
Revenue: –
Headquarters: Menlo Park, California
Launch Date: August 9th, 2011
Founders: Mark Zuckerberg

8. Douyin

Douyin is the Chinese version of Tiktok. Tiktok and Douyin are both owned by the same company, ByteDance. The two platforms are virtually the same. However, Tiktok and Douyin’s video content are not accessible to each other. Douyin has some extra features, such as in-video search and tap-to-purchase.

Monthly Active Users: 600 million
Revenue: $4.6 billion (2021, with Tiktok)
Headquarters: Beijing, China
Launch Date: September 2016
Founders: Zhang Yiming

9. QQ

QQ is an instant messaging software service developed by Tencent, the Chinese tech brand behind WeChat. QQ was first launched in 1999. It offers social games, music, shopping, microblogging, movies, and group and voice chat.

Monthly Active Users: 564 million
Revenue: –
Headquarters: Shenzhen, China
Launch Date: February 1999
Founders: Ma Huateng

10. Sina Weibo
Sina Weibo is a Chinese microblogging website that launched in 2009. Users can share pictures and videos with comments available as text, images, and videos through the app or website. The website also has a verification process for celebrities and influencers.
- Monthly Active Users: 573 million
- Revenue: $2.257 billion
- Headquarters: Beijing, China
- Launch Date: August 14th, 2009
- Founders: Charles Chao

11. Kuaishou

Kuaishou is a Chinese short-form video-sharing mobile app. The app’s tagline is “embrace all lifestyles.” Kuaishou has also seen significant popularity outside China, such as in Brazil, Pakistan, and Indonesia. In China, the app is more prevalent amongst older crowds, while younger groups prefer Douyin.

Monthly Active Users: 572.9 million
Revenue: $10.57 Billion (2021)
Headquarters: Beijing, China
Launch Date: March 2011
Founders: Su Hua, Cheng Yixiao

12. Snapchat

Snapchat is a multimedia instant messaging app Developed by former Stanford University students Evans Spiegel, Bobby Murphy, and Reggie Brown. Users can send pictures and messages that are only available for a short time before they become inaccessible.

Monthly Active Users: 428 million
Revenue: $4.1 billion (2021)
Headquarters: Santa Monica, California
Launch Date: September 16th, 2011
Founders: Evan Speigel, Bobby Murphy, Reggie Brown

13. Telegram

Headquarters: Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Launch Date: August 13th, 2013
Founders: Nikolai and Pavel Durov
Monthly Active Users: 500 million
Revenue: –

14. Pinterest

Pinterest is an image-sharing social media service that enables users to discover and save information using images, graphics, and videos. Users can organize the collected information and save it on their pinboards.

Monthly Active Users: 430 million
Revenue: $2.578 Billion
Headquarters: San Francisco, California
Launch Date: December 2009
Founders: Ben Silbermann, Paul Sciarra, Evan Sharp

15. Twitter

Twitter is an American microblogging social platform where users can post and interact with microblogs called tweets. Users can post like and retweet posts. Twitter is popularly known as the favorite social media platform for males over 40.

Monthly Active Users: 229 million
Revenue: $5 billion
Headquarters: San Francisco, California
Launch Date: July 15th, 2006
Founders: Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz Stone, Evan Williams

16. Reddit

Reddit is a discussion website with social news aggregation and content rating. Registered users called Redditors can post content through links, text, images, or videos. Posts can be voted up or down by other users. Posts on Reddit are organized by communities called sub-Reddit.

Monthly Active Users: 430 million
Revenue: $6 billion
Headquarters: San Francisco, California
Launch Date: June 23rd, 2005
Founders: Steve Huffman, Aaron Swartz, Alexis Ohanian

17. Quora
Quora is a social media website that allows users to ask and answer questions. Users interact by submitting answers and comments to questions that have been asked by other users. Quora has a valuation of $4 billion, despite making only $20 million in revenue.
- Monthly Active Users: 300 million
- Revenue: $20 million
- Headquarters: Mountain View, California
- Launch Date: June 25th, 2009
- Founders: Adam D’Angelo, Charlie Cheever

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