In addition to asking how often they check the site for updates about others, we also asked Twitter users how often (if ever) they use the site to post their own content. We asked about nine different types of content that Twitter users might post to the site, and found that Twitter users tend to comment on a relatively wide range of topics—the typical user posts four of the nine different types of tweets we asked about in our survey.
Overall, observations related to users’ personal or professional lives are the most popular types of updates, while location-based tweets and links to videos are the least commonly mentioned:
- 72% of Twitter users in our sample say that they post updates related to their personal life, activities or interests. A total of one in five Twitter users (19%) say they post personal updates once a day or more.
- 62% of those we queried said they post updates related to their work life, activities or interests, with 12% doing so on a daily basis.
- 55% of these Twitter users share links to news stories. One in ten (12%) do this at least once a day.
- 54% of these Twitter users say they post humorous or philosophical observations about life in general, with 16% doing so on a daily basis.
- 53% of these Twitter users use Twitter to retweet material posted by others, with 18% doing so on a daily basis.
- 52% of these Twitter users send direct messages to other users, with 11% doing so on a daily basis.
- 40% use Twitter to share photos with others, with 12% doing so at least once a day.
- 28% use Twitter to share videos with others. Fewer than one in ten Twitter users (8%) do this once a day or more.
- 24% use the service to tweet their location, with 7% of users doing so on a daily basis.
