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Kenya’s digital rebound TikTok leads social media 3.3m users surge
The digital expansion comes as Kenya edges closer to saturation, making platforms’ appeal increasingly dependent on engagement quality, content relevance, and service innovation rather than mere account creation.
Kenya’s social media scene is bouncing back after a slower growth period, adding 3.3 million new active accounts between February and October 2025.
The 21.9 percent rise follows a near-stall in 2024 when the accounts grew 15.9 percent, which was a slowdown from the 38.2 percent surge recorded in 2023.
New statistics from global insights platform Datareportal show that by October, Kenyans were running 18.4 million active social media entities, which was equivalent to 31.8 percent of the population.
“Social media user identities may not represent unique individuals,” notes Datareportal in the report.
While the slower growth in 2024 had signaled a near saturation of the country’s online market, this year’s rebound points to renewed adoption driven by mobile access and youthful users, as well as expanded content offerings.
Data shows that TikTok led this year’s rebound, adding 4.72 million users, which was a 34.6 percent jump, including one million in between July and October, in an expansion that lays bare how short-form video formats continue to capture younger audiences and shape trends nationwide.
Meta-owned Facebook, however, retains its position as Kenya’s central platform, hitting 17 million users after it gained 3.4 million new accounts during the review period, which represented a 25 percent rise.
This, the report notes, demonstrates the app’s sustained relevance among communities, local businesses, and older users.
This came at a time when Facebook’s sister platform, Instagram, added 800,000 new users, driven chiefly by its appeal for lifestyle content, visual storytelling, and influencer-driven engagement among urban youth.
Other networks that witnessed growth in new user numbers during the period were messaging platforms such as Messenger and Snapchat, which added 550,000 and 1.4 million new subscribers, respectively, reflecting shifting preferences toward private, interactive, and visual communication spaces.
Professional networking site LinkedIn, on its part, added 1.2 million new accounts to reach 26.9 percent of Kenya’s internet users aged 18 and above, indicating a rising focus on career development online.
“This surge in digital activity has given rise to a wave of new online creators who are shaping trends, driving conversations, and turning their online presence into a livelihood,” noted Caroline Kiarie, an Assistant Professor at Aga Khan University Graduate School of Media and Communications, in a recent Business Daily commentary.
According to the report, gender composition varies across platforms, with Snapchat and Instagram attracting more women, as TikTok and X skews male subscribers, while Facebook, Messenger, and LinkedIn show a more balanced demographic distribution among users.
Social media networks have, in recent years, evolved to become key drivers of prime economic activities, with businesses increasingly leveraging the growth in audiences to, among other things, showcase products, engage clients as well as conduct sales.
The platforms have also risen to become pronounced tools of youth-led civic and political activism, with agitators deploying them as a mobilisation and sensitisation stage.
Last year, the country witnessed historic youth-led protests, which culminated in the storming of Parliament, with the activities having largely been mobilised on platforms such as X, TikTok, Facebook, and WhatsApp.
The expanded online space has been largely powered by an aggressive penetration of smartphones across the population, with the latest official data showing that the devices stood at 43.7 million as at close of June 2025, as feature phones stood at 29.5 million.
The digital expansion comes as Kenya edges closer to saturation, making platforms’ appeal increasingly dependent on engagement quality, content relevance, and service innovation rather than mere account creation.
Earlier this year, a survey by global research firm GeoPoll, which sampled 3,945 respondents from Kenya, found that 36 percent of users in the country spend more than six hours daily on social media.
“The survey reveals how users allocate their time on social media...The majority, accounting for 35 percent, spend between three and six hours daily on these platforms,” wrote GeoPoll in its report.
“Following closely, 31 percent of users engage for one to three hours.”
According to the survey, the respondents said social media had a positive impact on their overall well-being and mental health (60 percent), with an additional 23 percent saying it was somewhat positive.
In January this year, Kenyan authorities had spelt out a plot to compel social media firms to establish offices within the country’s borders as part of the measures to tame what the government termed as “rising abuse” of the online platforms by users.
