In terms of carbon dioxide emissions from social media apps in 2021, ******* (**** grams of carbon dioxide equivalent per minute) was first in the ranking, closely followed by Facebook (**** gEqCO2) and LinkedIn (**** gEqCO2), all apps with low carbon emissions. The social network with the most impactful news feed in terms of carbon dioxide emissions was TikTok. This is because this social network is based exclusively on watching videos and preloads videos from the newsfeed.
The source adds the following information :
"For this study, we chose to measure the news feed of the 10 most popular social media applications: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Reddit, Snapchat, TikTok, Twitch, Twitter, Youtube. Although these applications are different in terms of functionality, we have chosen to compare them in terms of carbon impact, energy consumption and data exchanged. It was measured on an S7 smartphone (Android 8), and the user scenarios with the duration of a minute to scroll through a feed, were carried out through the GREENSPECTOR Test Runner, allowing the performance of automated tests. Each measurement is the average of 3 homogeneous measurements (with a low standard deviation).
To assess the impacts of infrastructure (datacenter, network) in the carbon projection calculations, the source relied on the OneByte methodology based on real data measured on the volume of data exchanged. This assessment methodology takes into account the consumption of resources and energy in use for the requested equipment. As this is a very macroscopic approach, it is subject to uncertainty and could be refined to adapt to a given context, to a given tool. For the Carbon projection, the source assumed a 50 percent projection via a wifi network and 50 percent via a mobile network.
To assess the impacts of the mobile in the carbon projection calculations, the source has measured the energy consumption of the user scenario on a real device and in order to integrate the material impact share, the source relied on the theoretical wear rate generated by the user scenario on the battery, the first wearing part of a smartphone. 500 full charge and discharge cycles therefore cause a change of smartphone in the model."
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Greenspector. (October 21, 2021). Carbon (CO2) emissions of leading social media apps in 2021 (in grams of CO2 equivalent per minute) [Graph]. In Statista. Retrieved July 15, 2025, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/1177323/social-media-apps-energy-consumption-milliampere-hour-france/
Greenspector. "Carbon (CO2) emissions of leading social media apps in 2021 (in grams of CO2 equivalent per minute)." Chart. October 21, 2021. Statista. Accessed July 15, 2025. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1177323/social-media-apps-energy-consumption-milliampere-hour-france/
Greenspector. (2021). Carbon (CO2) emissions of leading social media apps in 2021 (in grams of CO2 equivalent per minute). Statista. Statista Inc.. Accessed: July 15, 2025. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1177323/social-media-apps-energy-consumption-milliampere-hour-france/
Greenspector. "Carbon (Co2) Emissions of Leading Social Media Apps in 2021 (in Grams of Co2 Equivalent per Minute)." Statista, Statista Inc., 21 Oct 2021, https://www.statista.com/statistics/1177323/social-media-apps-energy-consumption-milliampere-hour-france/
Greenspector, Carbon (CO2) emissions of leading social media apps in 2021 (in grams of CO2 equivalent per minute) Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/1177323/social-media-apps-energy-consumption-milliampere-hour-france/ (last visited July 15, 2025)
Carbon (CO2) emissions of leading social media apps in 2021 (in grams of CO2 equivalent per minute) [Graph], Greenspector, October 21, 2021. [Online]. Available: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1177323/social-media-apps-energy-consumption-milliampere-hour-france/