Number of Social Networking Users Has Doubled Since 2007

With Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social networking sites growing rapidly, it’s not too surprising that on the whole, the number of social networking users has doubled since 2007.

Specifically, 55.6 million adults – or just less than 1/3rd of the population - in the US now visit social networks at least monthly, according to a new report from Forrester Research. That’s up from just 15 percent of adults in 2007, and around 18 percent last year.

At that level, social networking is now more popular than instant messaging among adults, which 54.3 million people report using. However, watching video, online shopping, and email (contrary to other reports we’ve seen) are still more widely used than social networks.

Here’s the breakdown: