All news

Russians spend less time on social media after Instagram ban — survey

According to Mediascope, during the third week of April Russians above 12 spent 57-58 minutes per day on social media

MOSCOW, April 18. /TASS/. Russians have started spending less time on social networks following a ban on Instagram (owned by Meta Corporation, which is recognized as extremist in Russia), according to a survey by Russian media research company Mediascope.

"On March 14, one of the most popular social networks - Instagram - was blocked in Russia. Earlier, its share of social network users accounted for 15-20%. The audience partially switched to other resources, but the Instagram ban affected the total amount of such platforms’ use - the time spent on them by average Russian citizens has been reduced. The earlier blocked access to Facebook (banned in the Russian Federation; owned by Meta Corporation, which is recognized as extremist in Russia), did not have such an effect on overall figures," the survey revealed.

According to Mediascope, during the third week of April Russians above 12 spent 57-58 minutes per day on social media. From February 24 to March 14 this figure was higher - amid the beginning of the special military operation in Ukraine the users showed more interest in news broadcast on media channels. During that period, Russians spent 66-72 minutes per day on social media on average.

"The growing time of using social networks because of increasing attention to the news agenda was seen practically among all players. Telegram showed the biggest growth - the figure has risen since February 24 and remains stably high. The time spent on Instagram and Facebook significantly declined after the blocked access by Roskomnadzor (Russian media watchdog). The amount of time spent on other platforms is rather stable. TikTok remains the leader in terms of time, despite a slight decrease over the past few weeks," Mediascope said.

On average in April Russians spend from 69 to 76 minutes per day on TikTok, nearly 47 minutes on VKontakte and 35 minutes on Telegram, the survey showed.