Short-Form Videos Dominate Social Media Content
- We analyzed more than one million accounts across nine social media platforms
- Instagram’s algorithm changes grant smaller creators more visibility and reward high-quality Reels.
- Considerate engagement rate data across all platforms save TikTok and X.
Metricool announces the 2024 Social Media Study, a report based on comprehensive data on social media platform trends and insights, compared to the 2023 study.
This data investigates how brands rely on social media to promote their brands, and if the trends identified in the previous report have been fulfilled.
User engagement remains stable
One metric stood out among the rest, engagement. In the previous study, this was the only metric that remained consistent despite the drop in impressions, interactions, and reach.
Engagement has maintained its ratio in this report, meeting the predicted forecast, confirming that user engagement among brand’s content is unwavering. We can also conclude that brands continue to satisfy their audiences with valuable, shareable content.
We observed an increase in engagement across all analyzed social networks, except X, where we saw the biggest decrease in this metric (5.73% to 3.55%), and TikTok, decreasing from 5.77% to 4.64%.
Facebook (Reels), Instagram (Reels), LinkedIn, and Pinterest provided the positive engagement data, especially in the last two social media networks. LinkedIn recorded an increase from 8.75% to 11.32, while Pinterest increase from 4.36% to 5.93%.
Average interactions continue to climb
The average number of interactions has increase on all social platforms besides Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram, although the latter two need to be explained in more detail.
While the average number of interactions has increased in Facebook Reels, this is not true with regular feed posts. On Instagram, it is the opposite case. The average number of interactions in posts have increased, while Instagram Reels have suffered a minimal decrease.
X stands out amongst the rest of the social networks because despite the decrease in brand’s average posting frequency, average interactions has grown from 69.13 to 75.25. Additionally, brands continue to create content that provokes user engagement, as reflected by the increase in replies and quote reposts.
LinkedIn closely leads with average interaction, recording an increase in the average number of interactions thanks to increased user participation in main interaction metrics: clicks, comments, reactions, and shares. This data shows that LinkedIn rewards highly engaged content and users value the quality of content.
Short-form videos remain brand’s strongest content format
Video content on social media is the star format for a reason: Brands and users prefer short-form content. This format has grown across all social platforms dedicated to this content: TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook.
This report found that brands participate more on TikTok, publishing a greater number of videos in the sample. Meanwhile, these videos reached more users, with an average reach increase from 7,727.3 in 2023 to 12,762.45 in 2024. Another striking finding is the increase in average video length, increasing by almost 3 seconds compared to 2023. The network continues to test longer video durations, and brands are responding.
With Instagram, the average posting frequency increases across all account sizes, especially for Huge accounts, which saw a jump from 17.53 to 19.05 during the sample collection. This demonstrates the popularity of the format, and the necessity to maintain quality content sharing.
On the other hand, Facebook Reels experienced mixed metric changes. For example, the brand’s average number of posts increase, proving their commitment to frequency sharing content with their audiences. The average number of interactions has increased, as the engagement ratio,
