10 Major Social Media Trends in 2025

Staying informed about social media trends can help you maintain or expand the success of your channels. While some types of social media trends can move quickly, like memes, others are more long-term, and you can use these to inform your overarching social media marketing strategy and content calendar.

In this article, we’ll discuss the dominant social media trends for 2025 that you can use as you shape your marketing strategy. Afterward, if you're interested in building key social media skills, consider enrolling in Meta's Social Media Marketing Professional Certificate, where you'll learn about managing a content calendar, establishing a brand on social media, and techniques used to optimize marketing campaigns, such as attribution and marketing mix models.

Top social media trends of 2025

Long-term social media trends typically involve shifts in user behaviors—like preferences for video over static images—and platform functionality, like social media companies introducing on-platform shopping features. The ten most important social media trends at the moment are:

1. Artificial intelligence (AI) is being used more consistently to create content.

2. GenAI tools are improving social media campaigns using marketing analytics.

3. Short-form video rules, but long-form content may gain traction.

4. Consumer shopping habits are boosting social commerce.

5. Social media platforms are becoming viable search engines.

6. Followers are seeking authentic connections.

7. Content creators and influencers are core pieces of social media strategy.

8. Personalization is increasing in importance.

9. Brands will prioritize social platforms by return on investment (ROI).

10. Experimenting with creativity (over playing it safe) is yielding impressive resuls.

Below, we'll go into each one of these trends in more detail. To compile our list, we synthesized findings from several industry reports and studies from companies like Sprout Social, Hootsuite, HubSpot, and Gartner. As you read through it, remember that your social media strategy may not necessarily include every aspect of this list. It’s important to consider how well these trends align with your business goals.

1. AI is being used to create content.

Seventy-five percent of workers use generative AI (GenAI), according to a survey conducted by AIPRM [1]. For marketing professionals, GenAI tools like ChatGPT and Google Gemini can improve day-to-day processes and tasks. A 2023 report from Sprout Social found that 80 percent of marketers say that AI has positively impacted their work, with 78 percent reporting that they have more time for creativity and 73 percent reporting increased efficiency [2].

Using GenAI for content creation

According to a 2024 HubSpot report, marketers consistently use GenAI throughout the content creation process: 34 percent use it for research, 41 percent use it to outline content, and 46 percent use it to draft content [3].

As you incorporate AI into your social media posts, it's important to consider your audience and brand voice. In a 2024 survey, Hootsuite found that 62 percent of consumers are less likely to engage with or trust AI-generated content—a sentiment that's particularly pronounced among older generations [4].

• Advance your GenAI content creation skills with Adobe's Content Creator Professional Certificate, where you’ll learn techniques for using GenAI tools to enhance your creative flow and save time throughout the production process:

2. AI is also being used to improve campaigns using marketing analytics.

Social media marketers have been using marketing analytics, such as engagement metrics, to inform their content calendar for quite some time. Now, AI can enhance your analysis capabilities, producing more robust insights and reliable trend predictions.

There are a few ways you can start incorporating AI into your marketing analytics. Some common social media tools, like Sprout Social, offer AI-powered features within their interface, but you can also prompt ChatGPT to conduct a data analysis.

• Advance your marketing analytics skills with the Meta Marketing Analytics Professional Certificate. You’ll learn how to analyze marketing data and turn your insights into actionable strategies.

3. Short-form video rules, but long-form content may gain traction.

Consumers primarily want brand social media accounts to focus on short-form videos, like those found on TikTok, Instagram Reels, or YouTube Shorts, according to a report from Sprout Social [5]. This desire is generally aligned with what social media marketers are already doing, as HubSpot found that over half of marketers who include short-form video in their marketing strategy plan to increase their investment in it throughout 2024 [6].

However, it’s worth noting that TikTok has been testing the boundaries of users’ attention spans. In January 2024, TechCrunch reported that the app expanded its long-form upload limits to 30 minutes after previously testing 3-minute, 10-minute, and 15-minute limits [7].

• Advance your TikTok skills with Aptly’s Marketing with TikTok Specialization.

4. Consumer shopping habits are boosting social commerce.

An increasing number of social media users now make purchases directly in their apps. According to Statista, in 2023, there were 106.8 million social buyers in the US. By 2027, they forecast that this figure will grow by over 10 percent to 118 million [8].

At the same time, social media companies are making it easier to shop on their platforms—take, for example, the introduction of the TikTok shop—which can help to encourage in-app consumer behaviors.

• Learn more about e-commerce business practices with the Google Digital Marketing & E-commerce Professional Certificate.

5. Social media platforms are becoming viable search engines.

The social media landscape has expanded beyond newsfeeds. Now, more users are treating the platforms as search engines, seeking product recommendations, advice, and more. Prabhakar Raghavan, a Google senior vice president, said that the company estimates 40 percent of young people use TikTok or Instagram as search engines [9]. This user trend underscores the importance of understanding the search and discovery features on your social media channels and optimizing your content for them.

• Advance your SEO skills with the University of California, Davis' Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Specialization.

6. Followers are seeking authentic connections.

When you’re thinking about how to communicate with your social media audiences, authenticity should be top of mind. To meet that need, brands are investing more in content that educates and informs their audiences without trying to sell or promote anything, according to Hootesuite's Social Media Trends 2025 report [10].

And who shares those messages matters. In Sprout Social's Content Benchmark Report, users said they largely wanted to see average people in social media posts: front-line employees (48 percent), social media teams (42 percent), and real customers (42 percent). Meanwhile, executive leadership lagged in popularity, with only 15 percent of respondents expressing that desire [5].

As you think about how to maintain relevance on your brand's social media accounts, it’s worth considering how you can show up authentically and foster a genuine connection with your target audience.

• Advance your online community-building skills with Northwestern University’s ​​Social Media Marketing Specialization.

7. Content creators and influencers are core pieces of social media strategy.

Speaking of authenticity, sometimes, it’s easier for audiences to believe something about your brand when the information comes from a third party. This is part of the reason why marketers continue to include content creators and influencers in their social media strategy. According to HubSpot, 50 percent of marketers who use influencer marketing plan to increase their investment in their strategy in 2024 [6].

However, it’s not just known influencers that social media marketers are turning toward, but also the average content creator. User-generated content (UGC) has emerged as a cost-effective way to promote brand awareness and products in a way that feels more natural than influencer partnerships can feel. A report from Gartner found that over 80 percent of consumers believe that UGC improves product discovery, brand trust, and experience [11].

• Learn more about developing diverse digital content, including videos, podcasts, and infographics with Adobe's Content Creator Professional Certificate.

8. Personalization is increasingly important.

According to Sprout Social, 51 percent of consumers say the most memorable brands on social media respond to customers, 76 percent value how quickly a brand responds to their needs, and 70 percent expect a personalized response to customer service needs [2].

To efficiently accommodate this high-touch service, social media teams are again turning to AI, using chatbots and automation tools that can respond to basic customer needs—and it seems to be working. HubSpot reports that 72 percent of marketers agree that these tools help them ‌personalize the customer experience, and 58 percent of marketers plan to increase their investments in AI and automation in 2024 [6].

• Learn how to use natural language processing techniques to improve your social media insights with the Johns Hopkins Social Media Analytics Specialization.

9. Brands will prioritize social platforms by ROI.

Brand leaders are thinking more strategically about the business value of their chosen platforms and prioritizing efforts on those that deliver the strongest ROI. This trend may be driven by two important points:

• A decline in user trust stands to reshape the way people use social media, making it more important for brands to use social media wisely. Gartner forecasts that by 2025, 50 percent of consumers will significantly limit their social media usage due to their perception of platform quality [11]. 

• According to Hootsuite, as social media teams increasingly feel overextended by the number of platforms they’re managing, they’re assessing which platforms are delivering the results they want to see and are dropping their use of those that aren’t [4].

The biggest platform usage changes from 2022 to 2023 include increased usage on TikTok and LinkedIn (16 percent and 5 percent, respectively), and decreases in use across WhatsApp, Pinterest, and X (18 percent, 11 percent, and 7 percent, respectively) [3]. Meanwhile, HubSpot reports that the platforms with the strongest ROI, according to marketers, are Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok [5]. 

• Learn more about key business metrics with the University of Virginia’s ​​Marketing Analytics course.

10. Bold creative moves are the future.

There tends to be an established way of doing things for every brand. But in recent years, social media has been evolving into a compelling playground where bold creative moves—especially those that seem "off-brand"—yield impressive results.

According to Hootsuite's Social Media Trends 2025 report, social media teams are increasingly experimenting with creativity across their channels, even if it looks different from how the company promotes itself elsewhere [10]. Now isn't the time to play it safe. Instead, lean into creative posts that break the mold.

• Learn more about the possibilities of harnessing GenAI for your creative needs with the University of Michigan's AI for Creative Work Specialization.

Advance your social media marketing skills on Coursera

Whether you're interested in beginning your social media career or advancing toward a more strategic or managerial role, there are a number of ways to develop important social media marketing skills on Coursera.

• Gain a comprehensive understanding of social media marketing with the Meta Social Media Marketing Professional Certificate on Coursera. Over six courses, you’ll learn the skills you need to qualify for entry-level roles in social media.

• Advance your social media analytics skills by working with natural language processing techniques in the Johns Hopkins Social Media Analytics Specialization. Over four courses, you'll learn how to use natural language processing techniques to extract insights from user-generated content and improve engagement strategies.