Social networking platforms have a great impact on our day-to-day life. People all over the world use multiple social media platforms for several reasons but in most cases, the reason is just recreation. The growth rate of use of social media platforms will continue in the coming days.
We know about a bunch of social media platforms that are dominating in the present scenario. They are actually competing with each other to get the top rank by achieving most user’s activity and net worth.
Albeit people aren’t interested in the ranking and competition between different social media platforms. A few of them are distinguished regarding this and they keep tracking the net worth of top social media platforms and for other exciting social media statistics.
If you are one of them and interested to know about the topic, then this article is for you. Here we bring some interesting facts and discussions that work behind the ranking. Want to know about them? Let’s jump directly into the discussion below.
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When it comes to the question of ranking social media platforms, there goes variation based on the metrics you used to measure it. Social media ranking varies on the total users, net worth, daily average user activity, and so on.
For your information, there are approximately 4.33 billion social media users over the world in 2021. That means, more than 55 percent of the total global population is now directly connected with social media.
Through social media platforms, the world genuinely has become a global village where people are connected with each other no matter the regional distance. Moreover, social media platforms aren’t restricted just to making social connections and sharing opinions, they are now mostly used for making online business, digital marketing, and so on.
You can see Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and all other social media platforms used for business and marketing purposes. They are so effective to make brand identity, a particular audience base that really makes online business easy and comfortable.
According to the net worth, what are the top 10 social media platforms in 2021? We have created the list for your convenience and managed some other mind-blowing information regarding this. So, let’s take a look at them here below,
10. Tumblr – Net worth $1.5 billion
Tumblr has evolved as a social networking and microblogging platform since 2007. It is one of the best platforms for bloggers to make niche blogging. Tumblr includes so many features for specifically blogging. One can post multimedia and other content in their Tumblr profile and if they want they can make posts private.
The main source of Tumblr revenue is advertising. It has started advertising and launched the first advert in 2012. In the first year of the advertising journey, Tumblr made $13 million from advertising. Over the days, Tumblr got popular as a social media platform with a consistent user base.
As of 2016, it has more than 500 million users per month but the number decreased due to the expensive extension of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. according to January 2021, it has 327 million visitors worldwide.
After being purchased by Yahoo, Tumblr revenue got a huge raise in 2013 when it gained $1.1 billion. In 2019, Tumblr was purchased by WordPress for $3 million. However, Tumblr has faced huge criticism as it was allowed sexual content that is currently banned.
As the total number of users goes down, Tumblr’s net worth also falls with that. but it is still making money with an estimated annual revenue of $65 million.
9. Reddit – Net worth $3 billion
Reddit is now one of the popular social media networks which have over 430 million active uses all over the world. You can say it as a multipurpose platform where users can make social news aggregation, discuss various topics that they want, ask for professional and user ratings of any product and service, and so on.
The current net worth of Reddit is around $3 billion. It offers some exciting features that make it distinct from Facebook and Instagram like social media platforms. It is structured upon the question-answer based platform where users can make questions about anything and those who have known, they can make an answer as response.
No matter what’s going on in your mind, you can share that on this platform if you are looking for instructions to follow. The platform was founded in 2005, at that time, it ran as an old school discussion forum. But currently, Reddit is a worldwide discussion platform having more than 25% of adult users in the US.
Like other social media platforms, Reddit makes money through selling advertisement space. Besides, it has premium membership plans which are optional but it also makes a little money from that. It also conducts auction-based advertising.
8. WhatsApp – Net worth $25 billion
WhatsApp is an instant messaging app founded by two former Yahoo employees in 2009. The app was acquired by Facebook in 2014 for an estimated $19.3 billion. As an instant messaging app, WhatsApp offers plenty of messaging features that makes it nearly popular among users.
It allows groups, stories, page style feeds, video and audio calling, and so on. Once can use WhatsApp for customer services, retention makes it usable even for brand purposes. Whatsapp messages are free to send, you just need a stable internet connection and a real time contact number to create an account on WhatsApp.
Whatsapp makes money in two ways, one is WhatsApp for business API and the other is showing ads. The business model helps businesses manage customer responses boldly. Currently, it has over $2 billion users all over the world and 390 million in India alone.
After the acquisition, WhatsApp generated $4594 million in 2014, $5462 million in 2015, and approximately $8 billion in 2020 for Facebook. This is why Facebook invested huge money to own this amazing messaging app.
However, Facebook doesn’t share product wise revenue breakups of its income, therefore, it is just an idea of WhatsApp revenue for Facebook.
7. LinkedIn – Net worth $29.5 billion
With the massive job requirement and employee hiring post every day, LinkedIn is more than a social media platform. Unlike other social media networks where people just post unusual issues to get attention, you can find only necessary resources, topics, and discussions on LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is getting popular nowadays. It was launched in 2003 and its headquarter established in California, US. You have all the social media options like messaging, notifications, any types of content including article posts for bloggers and writers. But it is mostly used by job seekers and employers making job posts and getting hired professionally.
LinkedIn makes money by selling access to information about its members to recruiters and sales professionals. Statistics show that LinkedIn has had 740 million registered members from 150 countries since February 2021. Besides selling recruitment information, it also sells advertisement spaces, courses, and premium membership benefits.
it has generated $8 billion in revenue in the year 2020. It has a 19% growth rating over revenue every year. At present, LinkedIn is known as the best professional social networking platform where people are just concerned about getting connected with high-profile persons all over the world. The US, China, and India are the countries with the most LinkedIn users right now.
6. Pinterest – Net worth $38 billion
Pinterest is mainly an image sharing social media platform which is so useful for brands and businesses making image based identity, awareness, and traffic over the internet. It was founded in 2009 and listed as one of the 50 best websites of 2011 by Time magazine. Because of the rapid usage of images online, Pinterest got a huge response in the recent period as it successfully gathered more than 100 million monthly active users in 2020.
Images are getting priority nowadays. Since Google has to include an image search option, Pinterest made it easier for both authors and searchers to get the preferred image on a single platform. It has a huge category based image directory where users can easily find the desired image just by searching with the keyword.
Pinterest earned its first revenue in 2014 from advertising as it was started to charge website advertisers. In 2016, ads on the site generated approximately $500 million in revenue. In 2015, investors valued Pinterest, Inc. at $11 billion, making it a “unicorn” (a start-up with a valuation exceeding $1 billion). As of 2017, the company was valued at $12 billion.
It now has over 442 million active users worldwide and the number is increasing every day due to the massive requirement of image-based data management systems.
5. Twitter – Net worth $43.32 billion
Twitter is a microblogging platform that allows users to publish tweets within limited characters. It entered into the social networking scene in 2006 and slightly gained attention over time. It includes so many features like posts, tweets, and retweets for the registered users.
By 2012, more than 100 million users posted 340 million tweets a day, and the service handled an average of 1.6 billion search queries per day.
Twitter can be used by individual users and also businesses and brands to engage with people showing their offerings, exclusive features, and new arrivals. Users can follow famous persons on Twitter, and get informed about their activities through the shared tweets.
Twitter has an estimated over 353 million monthly active users and generated approximately $3.72 billion in 2020. Currently, it has 353 million monthly active users among them US users spend on average 158.2 minutes per month on the app.
However, Twitter is a great platform that lets you connect industry leading topics and issues. You can get news and views on a variety of topics and it supports hashtags to catch trendy issues going on the platform. The main sources of Twitter revenue in promoting posts and stories of individuals which is a part of Twitter advertising.
4. Instagram – Net worth $110 billion
Instagram is the second most used social media platform that allows photo and video share and messaging, video calling also. Facebook acquired Instagram for approximately $1 billion in 2012. Instagram is also popular because of its extreme editing option that can use anyone for filters and other edit options.
Instagram is now playing a central role for digital marketers and brands making brand identity and awareness through regular posts and brand profiles. With more than 1 billion active users, it occupies 500 million active users daily.
Instagram generates most of its revenue through marketing and advertising. 39% of brands spend over 20% of their marketing budget on influencer marketing. As of 2019, an estimated $1.35 billion spent on Instagram influencer marketing by brands in the US and Canada.
Though Facebook doesn’t publish revenue earning specifically, it is guessed by the experts that Instagram has brought $20 billion ad revenue against a total of $70 billion ad revenue earned by Facebook in 2019.
Among all the features of Instagram, the story has gained the highest popularity and recently it has added IGTV which helps brands and businesses engage consumers more and effectively.
3. YouTube – Net worth $170 billion
Youtube is a video social media platform where you can find only videos of anything you want. YouTube has the second most monthly active social media users and maybe the number one personal brand making platform also. Currently, it has approximately 2.29 million active users, and 70% of adults in the US use it to find their required solution, listening to songs, watching movies, etc.
However, one can use youtube whether or not they are a registered member. Currently, it has 2.29 billion registered users and you may know a bunch of them as being a YouTube star is now a matter of hard work but commendable.
However, YouTube is Google’s product as Google acquired YouTube for $1.6 billion in 2006. But it provides the value of the whole money delivering 100x return as revenue to google. YouTube gained up to $19.7 billion in 2020 that makes it the 2nd position of the most earned social media right now.
YouTube generates most of its revenue by displaying ads. Because of the rapid growth of the user base, YouTube has become a separate competitive marketing field where marketers have to implement different strategies and planning to get success like search engine optimization.
2. TikTok – Net worth $250 billion
TikTok is another video sharing social networking service but it has a restriction that videos need to be 15 seconds to 1 minute in duration. Users mostly create short videos showing a glimpse of their dancing, singing, comedy, and educational content within this short period. The app is developed by the Chinese company Bytedance and released in 2016.
TikTok has over 700 million active users at present. In 2020, it was named at the top of the most downloaded apps. People of all ages are now having fun doing TikTok videos in their leisure. TikTok allows users to create short videos easily, add music in the background, use filters, and other video editing options like speed up, slow down, etc.
Like other social media platforms, TikTok also makes its way making revenue from advertising. It includes great advertising formulas TikTok for business which allows brands to make personal advertising on this platform. Also it other models like In-Feed ads, Brand Takeovers, and Branded hashtag challenges.
Though ByteDance hasn’t clearly revealed the revenue report of TikTok as an expert’s opinion, TikTok has generated approximately $8-$9 billion in the year 2020 and the number was $7-8.4 for the first six months of 2019.
1. Facebook – Net worth $280 billion
In the world of social media platforms, it is not so necessary to introduce Facebook specifically. It is dominating as the most used social media platform all over the world with the highest daily active users and activities. As of the first quarter of 2021, it counts 2.85 million monthly active users roughly.
When developed, Facebook was limited to Harvard students. But the membership expanded to other universities and it was opened for the common people in 2006. Since then, Facebook has become the number 1 social networking platform offering exclusive features and sometimes more than other social network platforms.
Users can register Facebook with an email or phone number and can access all the included features instantly. India and the United States are on the top of using Facebook on a daily basis.
However, Facebook earns revenue by selling ads. It also earns by boosting events as marketers boost their posts to reach the target audience to sell their products. Since Facebook collects the user data, it uses the data for the marketer’s convenience and in return, they take a little fee.
Besides using for common social networking purposes, Facebook has become the main field of online social media business and marketing. Facebook provides huge chances for small retailers as they can sell any products directly to consumers without zero investment. Facebook marketing is one of the most practiced and concerning issues for present marketers all over the world.
Facebook has an approximately 30% increase in its revenue per year and as of the first quarter of 2021, it has generated $26.17 billion through advertising.
Finally, it can easily be understood that the highest net worth conceded social media network is Facebook. And the list shown above, are the top 10 social media platforms listed by the current net worth. It also makes sense for net revenue generation of them and you can determine which one is earning the highest revenue in the current online scene by the ranking above.