Remember those bygone days when Facebook was the go-to platform to keep up with friends and family? Well, it seems like young people are now more into following trends and influencers than following people they already know. New platforms like TikTok have sprung up, capitalising on these changes. TikTok's short, engaging videos have taken the digital world by storm, and of course platforms like Discord are becoming increasingly popular with young people as well. Twitter, sorry, ‘X’, reached its peak in popularity ten years ago, and about 1 in 5 young people had profiles between 2016-2019.

During the pandemic young people spent more time online, moving their socialisation entirely to the digital realm, and often juggling multiple screens. TikTok continued to be a hit, with hours spent consuming and creating content. Unfortunately data from the graph above ends in 2019, but in 2022 a global survey found that 1 in 2 UK children and young people, aged 4-18, were hopping onto TikTok. And get this, they were hanging out there for an average of 114 minutes every day! And after its eventful year, it seems Twitter/X might be making a comeback. In 2022, more than 1 in 3 young people claimed they were using it.¹