Twitter lags far behind Facebook in US online usage

According to the Pew Research Centre report, 72% of adult internet users in the US are currently using Facebook

Facebook remains the most popular social network platform for US internet users whereas Twitter has failed to attract more users since last September, says a study.

According to the Pew Research Centre report, 72 per cent of adult internet users in the US are currently using Facebook, a proportion barely changed from September 2014, Xinhua reported.

Only 23 per cent of all online adults use Twitter, a proportion identical to that in September 2014, the report said.

The report found that Facebook is especially popular among women who are online.

Demographically speaking, younger population is also more inclined to use Facebook, a finding consistent with the past research.

According to the Pew report, 82 per cent of online adults between the age of 18 and 29 use Facebook.

While popularity of Facebook has not dipped in face of a wider range of other social networking tools, such as Pinterest which enjoys 31 per cent of online usage and Instagram which boasts 28 per cent of online usage, Twitter has failed to keep apace with its rivals in terms of attracting internet users.

Compared with the elderly, young people are more likely to use Twitter, said the report.

However, the popularity of Twitter among younger adults is far lower than that of Facebook. Only 32 per cent of online adults between the age of 18 and 29 use Twitter.

Twitter also has difficulty in luring its users back more frequently. Only 38 percent of Twitter users report visiting the site every day.

The Pew report is based on telephone interviews conducted from March 17 through April 12 among a national sample of 1,907 adults.