eMarketer says Facebook lost ~2.8M US users under 25 in 2017, predicts it will lose ~2.1M in 2018; Instagram's US users will grow 13%, Snapchat's by 9% in 2018
That's according to research firm eMarketer. — Facebook is losing young users even quicker than expected, according to new estimates by eMarketer.
Context & Ripple Effects
eMarketer's 2018 estimates put numbers on what had been anecdotal: Facebook losing its youngest US cohort faster than expected, with Instagram (+13%) and Snapchat (+9%) absorbing the attention instead. A Pew study from weeks later showed how crowded that field already was — 78% of 18-24s on Snapchat, 71% on Instagram, 94% on YouTube.
The forecast aged well as a directional call. A year later, Edison Research counted 15M fewer US Facebook users than in 2017, concentrated in the 12-34 bracket, and by 2021 Facebook's own internal docs showed US teen time spent down 16% year over year.
First-order effects
- Facebook's under-25 US audience — the demographic advertisers pay premiums for — shrinks by a projected ~2.1M in 2018 on top of 2017's ~2.8M loss, directly reducing inventory for that segment.
Second-order effects
- Ad dollars follow the migration: Instagram's 13% US growth makes it Facebook's own hedge against the parent app's youth exodus, while Snapchat's 9% growth gives brands a second visual-first alternative at lower share.
Third-order effects
- The pattern held beyond 2018 — but cut both ways: Instagram's own US growth decelerated to single digits (6.7% in 2019, down from 10.1%) and Snapchat flipped to decline, suggesting the youth market rotates between apps rather than settling anywhere permanently.
The trend: US teen and young-adult attention has been rotating off Facebook since 2017 toward visual-first rivals, with each successor platform eventually hitting its own growth ceiling.