French people spend about 3h30 hours online every day – survey

Roughly eight in ten French people use the internet daily, and they spend about three and a half hours on average online, according to a new survey.

The report from the French Regulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication (ARCOM) was based on survey data from 20,000 people aged 12 and over.

The survey found that very large platforms such as Google, YouTube, Facebook, and Snapchat make up nearly half of people’s time spent using the internet.

Social media platforms were where people spent the most amount of time, with Snapchat being the app visited for the longest amount of time, followed by Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). 

Concerns for the teenage audience

Snapchat and TikTok were both favoured by a younger audience with respectively 16 and 14 per cent of users being minors. 

There have been growing concerns regarding the time spent by teenagers on these platforms as well as the content they are exposed to.

Those aged 12 to 17 spend over half of their 116 monthly internet hours on one of the two platforms, the ARCOM survey found.

Some organisations estimate that “sedentary, recreational screen time” should be limited to half that time, some 60 hours per month. 

Earlier this year, French President Emmanuel Macron advocated for a Europe-wide social media age restriction for teens under 15 with parents monitoring children’s use before that age. 

The survey also found that the pornographic website Pornhub was one of the platforms frequented the most by minors who represent 16 per cent of visitors. 

On average, 40 per cent of teenagers aged 12 to 17 visit adult websites, according to the survey, and the number has been stable since 2019. 

France and Spain are both in the process of implementing age-verification processes for pornographic websites.

Obligations for very large online platforms under the DSA

The survey was carried out as part of France’s observatory for very large online platforms and search engines, which the European Commission defines as platforms reaching at least 45 million monthly active users. 

Under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), very large platforms are required to tackle issues like illegal content, misinformation, and user privacy.

This includes a complete ban on targeting minors with advertisements based on profiling or personal data.

A French committee dedicated to digital use recommends having no screen time for children under three and no social media access for teenagers under 15.