BENGALURU, Jan 29 (Reuters) – India is one of the most critical growth markets for social media companies, which are now facing calls to limit access to young people, amid fears of “digital addiction”.
Here are facts about India’s vast internet and smartphone market key to plans by the likes of Meta and Alphabet’s YouTube.
USER BASE AND CONNECTIVITY
India’s total internet users numbered nearly 1.02 billion by September 2025, a sharp increase from about 250 million in 2014. The country is also the world’s No. 2 smartphone market, with 750 million devices.
India is home to 500 million unique social media users, to data from research firm DataReportal shows.
Alphabet and Meta do not officially disclose country-specific figures, but DataReportal pegs YouTube users in India at 500 million, Facebook 403 million, Instagram at 481 million, and Snapchat at 213 million.
Elon Musk’s X has about 22 million users.
USAGE INTENSITY AND CONSUMPTION PATTERNS
Average monthly data consumption per user surged by 399 times to roughly 24 gigabyte in 2025 in India, up from 62 megabytes in 2014, one of the world’s highest, government figures show.
Such use benefits from an average cost of just 10 cents per GB, one of the lowest globally.
Social media dominates Indians’ daily usage, with an average of 3.2 hours spent on such apps daily, according to a 2023 report from research firm Esya Centre.
CHILDREN AND SMARTPHONE USE
Roughly 24% of India’s population is younger than 14, United Nations data shows.
While specific estimates of children’s social media usage are not available, India found in a 2024 survey that nearly 90% of children aged 14 to 16 have access to smartphones at home.
Recreational use dominates screen time, with 76% of the surveyed children in that age group accessing social media, compared to just 57% using the devices for education in the week prior to the survey.
(Reporting by Munsif Vengattil in Bengaluru; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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