We Are Social and Hootsuite released a report in January this year called “Digital in 2018 ″, in which it shows that more than half of the world's population is online (about 4,021 billion), of which about a quarter of a billion new users achieved the feat for the first time in 2017.
The report also points out that much of this growth was due to the accessibility to mobile plans and the acquisition of smartphones. As an example, the reported number of internet users in Mali has increased almost 6 times since January of 2017, as have those in Benin, Sierra Leone, Niger and Mozambique which also doubled in the last year.
More than 200 millions of people had their first mobile device in 2017, and two-thirds of the world's 7,6 billion (5,135 billion) now own a mobile phone.
Mobile penetration rates are still below 50% in much of Central Africa. Regarding social networks, the report points out that more than 3 billion people worldwide use social networks every month, with 9 out of 10 users accessing their platforms of choice through any mobile device.
Last year, there were 11 new users in social networks every second, in a universe of 1 million people who used social media for the first time every day.
