Facebook market reach & traffic statistics 2023
Oli Lynch
|Marketing | May 16, 2023
The undisputed King of Social Media Networks, the third most visited website, and the most downloaded app. Facebook is all of these, and as it grows, more accolades follow.
Some people love Facebook, and others hate it. Over the years, they’ve courted controversy, fallen foul of a number of local laws, and even had some data breach shockers. But there is no question that Facebook is still the best marketing platform for paid social. TikTok? Yes, they are growing fast and might yet topple the King – but it hasn’t happened yet.
For marketers looking to improve their social reach, it is till Facebook. To top it off, they also own the world’s two biggest instant messenger services and another big social media platform, Instagram.
And as Mr. Zuckerberg looks to the future and the metaverse, there is no question that Facebook is and will remain a huge player online. In fact, if you’re looking to get in on cutting-edge marketing angles, chances are Facebook will be there.
So, let’s take a closer look at Facebook traffic and its global market reach.
Facebook traffic statistics
Facebook’s traffic is huge, with around 22 billion visits each month in 2022, according to SimilarWeb.
There are 2.8 billion monthly active users, of which 1.84 billion visit daily.
The biggest markets for Facebook traffic are:
- USA 23%
- Vietnam 4.4%
- UK 4%
- Brazil 3.9%
- Poland 3.85%
Of these visitors, the vast majority is direct traffic, which is people visiting the site directly. In fact, 83.3% of all Facebook traffic is direct.
But Facebook traffic also comes from search results (11.19%), and a tiny percentage comes from other social media platforms (1.97%) and referrals (2.4%).
Facebook users are overwhelmingly mobile-based, with 98% of all visitors using mobile. Only 1.7% use laptops or desktop-based devices.
The Facebook Family
As well as its own huge platform, the Facebook family includes WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram.
In fact, Facebook Messenger is the second most downloaded app in the world (after, yup, Facebook itself!) and has over 1.3 billion monthly users.
Messenger is also the most downloaded app ever on the Apple app store.
The most downloaded apps of all time are (according to Android’s Play Store):
- Facebook Messenger
- YouTube
Yes, that’s right, Facebook owns four out of the five most downloaded apps ever.
Although WhatsApp is the bigger platform, with over 2 billion regular users, you can’t run ads on it yet. Facebook did announce plans to run ads on WhatsApp, which was met with a huge backlash, so, for now, at least, WhatsApp ads are a no-go.
Didn’t see TikTok on that list? Well, TikTok is the most downloaded app in 2021 and 2022, so expect to see it on the most downloaded apps ever list VERY SOON.
Instagram traffic statistics
Instagram also has over 1 billion users, with 500 million of those active daily. Put into simple figures, Instagram reaches a quarter of the internet-using public.
One of the most popular post formats is Instagram Stories, which also reaches 500 million users each day.
Instagram’s audience reach covers the globe, with most countries, bar China and North Korea, having a presence on the app.
The audience share for Instagram is:
- USA – 120 million
- India – 80 million
- Brazil – 77 million
- Indonesia – 63 million
- Russia – 44 million
Although these user numbers are bigger than some countries’ populations, the user figures for some other countries are incredible.
- UK – 28.89 million (42% of the population)
- Australia – 9.7 million (38% of the population)
- Germany – 30 million (35% of the population)
- Spain – 24 million (51% of the population)
- South Korea – 17 million (33% of the population)
- Canada – 15 million (39% of the population)
Put simply, the potential audience for Instagram extends to a large percentage of the national population in many countries.
Fake accounts & bots
With the huge demand for followers, engagement, and traffic, the underground industry has grown.
95 million Instagram accounts are believed to be fake or operated by bots. Often run from click farms, which are locations designed to produce fake website traffic, these bots can be hired to post spam comments, like, share, or follow, and amplify the spread of disinformation.
Facebook also suffers from a similar problem, with a huge volume of fake and duplicate accounts.
Some estimates put these fake Facebook accounts at around 270 million, or 13%-16% of the active accounts. (source)
The problem with this fake Facebook traffic for digital marketers is the issue of paying out for invalid impressions. If you’re paying for ads to target potential customers, you don’t want to spend money on these bots or spam accounts.
But despite these bots and fake accounts, the volume of traffic and the global reach of Facebook and Instagram make these channels worth investing in for digital advertising.
Read more about Facebook Ad fraud in our blog.
Marketing on the Facebook Family of apps
Apart from WhatsApp, marketing to the huge volume of Facebook traffic is made very accessible.
Advertisers can choose to run ads on each platform individually or run campaigns across the whole suite.
The options include:
- Sponsored posts (on Facebook and Instagram)
- Stories ads (in Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger)
- Messenger ads
- Audience Network (banner display ads within apps)
- Shopping ads for Instagram and Facebook
- Video ads (Facebook and Instagram)
Paid social on Facebook gives you some very powerful targeting options. And, as is the nature of social media, engagement, and conversions can be higher than paid search.
The conversion rate on Facebook has been found to be as high as 9%.
Compared to the 3-5% for Google Ads, this is obviously a very appealing prospect for marketers.
Facebook Ads are also often cheaper than Google Ads for similar campaigns.
However, despite the huge reach, Google Ads does offer a bigger potential audience size. Your Facebook Ads targeting is, of course, limited to users of these platforms. Paid search, however, can incorporate search results and the huge selection of websites on the Google Display Network.
Facebook Ads and Google Ads also have their own pros and cons, which is often why marketers use both.
Maximising your Facebook ad traffic quality
Making sure your ads target only genuine Facebook traffic, instead of bots or fake accounts, can be a headache for marketers.
How can you be sure that only genuine potential customers see your ads?
There is a way…
Using CHEQ is the best way to filter your Facebook traffic. With more control over your targeting, CHEQ allows you to exclude bad audiences such as bots, spam accounts, and other non-genuine traffic.
CHEQ Essentials is one of the only click fraud prevention solutions to offer Facebook Ads protection. Sign up for a free trial and run a diagnostic on your Facebook Ads today.
Author
Oli Lynch
Since working for CHEQ, Oli has become something of a click fraud nerd, and now bores people at parties with facts about click farms and internet traffic stats. When not writing about ad fraud, he helps companies to optimise their marketing content and strategy with his own content marketing business.
