A mind-blowing number of teens are spending 7+ hours a day on social media

And it’s even more for some groups of teens

Our understanding of what kids do online is always going to lag a little behind. By the time adults have figured out what “6, 7” means, kids have already moved on to another meme. Teens flock to a social media platform and then abandon it when it’s not cool anymore.

It’s especially tough for the administrators of large national surveys, like Monitoring the Future (MtF), that are done every year. They don’t want to change the survey too much since that makes it difficult to compare responses over the years, but they also want to make sure they are keeping up with the times.

From 2018 to 2023, MtF asked teens “About how many hours on an average DAY do you spend on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.?” The question was outdated almost as soon as it was asked. Facebook use was already going out of style among teens in 2018 (because Grandma was on Facebook). Twitter has never had considerable market share among teens. Instagram is the only platform listed in the item that a majority of teens use. And of course no one calls them “social networking sites” anymore.

That’s probably why MtF updated its question in 2024 to “About how many hours on an average DAY do you spend . . . on social media sites like TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, X, etc.?” At long last, the question includes the platforms teens use the most. Choices ranged from “none” to “9 hours or more.” Now we can finally get an idea of how much time teens are spending on social media in one of the largest and most reliable nationally representative surveys of U.S. teens.

In 2023, before the update, U.S. 8^th and 10^th graders (13 to 16 years old) estimated they spent about 3 hours a day using social media. In 2024, after the question mentioned the platforms teens actually use, their estimate was 4 and a half hours a day. Among girls, it was 5 hours a day. That’s an enormous amount of time.

But that’s not even the crazy part. The crazy part is how many are spending 7 or more hours a day using social media – close to the time commitment of a full-time job.

In 2024, that number was one out of four among U.S. 8^th graders. According to the U.S. Census, there were about 4 million 14-year-olds in the U.S. in 2024. That means about one million 14-year-olds spend 7 or more hours a day using social media. One million.

At this level, social media use is almost certainly interfering with sleep, schoolwork, exercise, and spending time with friends and family face-to-face. The numbers were even higher for 8^th grade girls: One in three spent 7 or more hours a day using social media (see Figure 1). If three girls sit next to each other in an 8^th grade class, the middle girl can look to her left and right and guess that one of them is spending the equivalent of a full-time job on social media. Even apart from the impacts on mental health, this is a tragic loss of potential.

Figure 1: Percent of teens using social media 7 or more hours a day, by gender and grade level, 2024. Source: Monitoring the Future data analyzed by Jean M. Twenge for the Generation Tech Substack. Note: Sample size for 12^th graders on this item is lower and should be interpreted with caution.

Fewer 10^th graders (15 and 16 years old) and even fewer 12^th graders (17 and 18 years old) spent this much time using social media. These data show once again that younger teens are the most vulnerable to social media algorithms. As I argue in 10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World, that’s why kids under 16 (and maybe even 18) shouldn’t have social media accounts at all. It’s why Australia raised the minimum age for social media accounts to 16.

These numbers were already staggering. When I analyzed the data within race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status, they got even more jaw-dropping.

Half of Black teen girls spend 7 or more hours a day using social media. Half.

So do more than a third of Hispanic girls, and a fifth of White girls (see Figure 2). Black and Hispanic boys are also much more likely than White boys to spend 7 or more hours a day using social media. All of these numbers are too high, but the difference by race and ethnicity is stunningly large. (I’ve focused on 8th and 10th graders here as their sample size on the social media item is more than sufficient; the sample size is much lower for 12th graders on this item, so the data are not as reliable when broken down by race and ethnicity).

Figure 2: Percent of 8^th and 10^th graders using social media 7 or more hours a day, by gender and race/ethnicity, 2024. Source: Monitoring the Future data analyzed by Jean M. Twenge for the Generation Tech Substack.

The hits just keep coming. Thirty-seven percent of girls whose mothers do not have a college education (indicative of lower socioeconomic status, or SES) spent 7 or more hours a day using social media, compared to 24% of girls whose mothers have a college education (higher SES). There’s a similar difference, though smaller, for boys. So the teens most likely to be poor — or at least not as advantaged — are spending the most time on social media (see Figure 3).

Figure 3: Percent of 8^th and 10^th graders using social media 7 or more hours a day, by gender and socioeconomic status (mother’s education), 2024. Source: Monitoring the Future data analyzed by Jean M. Twenge for the Generation Tech Substack.

We’ve always known that social media companies were making an enormous profit off the time and attention of teens. Now we know they are making even larger profits off the most vulnerable teens.