Australia is obsessed with Facebook, and here are the stats to prove it

Australians are fixated with Facebook, checking the network more frequently than any other country.

Australian Facebook users are far more mobile than the average. Picture: Carl Court/Getty Images.

Australia is officially obsessed with Facebook, with a new report declaring we lead the world for how often we check the social media platform.

The ‘Digital in 2017’ report, sixth in an annual series from Hootsuite and We Are Social, found Australia’s social network penetration saw double-digit growth this year at 14 per cent, with a total of 16 million Australians now on social media.

And we’re the most frequent users of it, with three quarters of Facebook users checking it daily compared with 55 per cent globally.

Australian users are far more mobile than the average, with 57 per cent of Australian social media users accessing it from mobile devices, a 68 per cent lead over the global average.

“Half of the world’s population is now online, which is a testament to the speed with which digital connectivity is helping to improve people’s lives,” We Are Social’s Simon Kemp said.

“Given this latest data, it’s probably time for us to stop referring to social as ‘new media’, and integrate it more seamlessly into our day-to-day activities.”

The report also found internet penetration globally has now hit 50 per cent, reaching 3.77 billion people, a 10 per cent increase in the last 12 months.

Just last month Facebook launched a new Melbourne office located at 720 Bourke street in Docklands, an HQ made up mostly of local sales and advertising reps.