Ofcom social media use report analysis 2026

Ofcom published their latest research, ‘Adults' Media Use and Attitudes 2026’. The report delves into our online lives and relationships with media. At a high level, the findings suggest a more cautious approach emerging to both digital consumption and contribution, including within social media…

Behaviours

• While social platform membership remains high (89%, rising to 97% among 16-34 year olds), almost half (49%) of people express concern that posting online could cause them problems in the future (up 6% YoY)

• Unsurprisingly, this has meant a decline in the proportion of people actively posting, sharing or commenting on social media (down 22% to 49%)

• The remainder of users are becoming more passive - 25% ‘like’ things that others have posted, while 24% read things without interacting much

• The people more likely to share, post or comment include younger adults aged 16-34 (58%) and those in AB socio-economic households (57%)

Attitudes

• The proportion of adult social media users who feel social media is good for their mental health has fallen this year. After rising to 42% in 2024, this measure has dropped back to 36% (similar to 2022 levels)

• A potential driver of this is the content within platforms, with 56% of users saying they have seen false or misleading news in the past year

• This rises to around two-thirds (65%) for social media users aged 16-34 

• Those who do seek to check accuracy are most often:

  • comparing information with other sources (43%) 

  • checking the original source (42%)

  • looking at the comments section for indications of credibility (41%, demonstrating the importance of other users’ reactions in shaping trust in social media)

• Adults who have had negative online experiences were far more likely to disagree (27%) that social media apps were good for their mental health versus the average adult (16%)

In many of these cases, it demonstrates that our experiences are more markedly shaping our opinions, and leading to pronounced behavioural changes. Some of these datapoints are marked shifts year-on-year, which is unusual in research of this kind. It shows the rapid pace of change in how we are behaving online and our attitudes to our experiences, making it more important than ever to consider how to maintain trust with an audience. In this context, discovery becomes more challenging and authenticity all the more important.

More closely at the intersection between brands and online content, there are indications that our ability to understand, and have trust in, what we’re seeing is stalling. 

• Just over half (52%) of search engine users correctly identified paid placements, which is unchanged since last year

• Interestingly, those aged 55-74 were more likely to identify sponsored links accurately (58% of 55-64s and 59% of 65-74s), whereas younger adults were least likely to

• Although eight in ten (81%) of adults felt confident in recognising advertising, just three in ten (30%) felt ‘very’ confident, which is a 16% decline since 2019, and half (51%) felt just ‘fairly’ confident in their ability

• When it comes to brand discovery, 17% said they believe that if a website appears in search results it will contain accurate and unbiased information, which is down from 27% last year

Further key findings include that:

• The proportion of people exploring new websites has fallen 14% (to 56%), with 40% saying they’ve used no new websites whatsoever

• While most adults (85%) say they use mainstream media for news, an almost equal proportion of people say they always trust it to be accurate (19%), versus always questioning its accuracy (21%)

• However, just 57% of adults say they would trust AI-generated news more than a human-written story, showing that there are still limits to how far the tool has infiltrated our lives despite adoption sitting at 54%

To find out more, see Ofcom’s website