You’d be forgiven for thinking that everyone has a net connection these days, but there are still millions of people who don’t have their own access online and hundreds of thousands more who have never even used the internet at all. However, new users are connecting to the internet every single day. However, the age group with the largest surge of new users isn’t the under 12’s: it’s people over 50.
The UK Online Measurement Company has released the results of a new study into UK net usage that has found net users have grown to 38.8 million from 36.9 million in the last year, and men over 50 accounted for 38% of that figure. Many older people might have been slower to catch on, but now more and more are coming online, and website owners and businesses providing digital services would be remiss to ignore the huge impact of the maturing web audience.
Speaking to BBC News, UKOM Spokesperson Alex Burmaster said: “The internet is getting older in more ways than one. Not only is the medium itself maturing, but the audience is shifting towards older age groups. There is a still a perception that the net is youth-centric but this is clearly not the reality,”
The study suggested that the over 50s were utilising a wide range of websites including video, genealogy and community websites.
Travel site Saga and health website RealAge report that the age groups represent 78% and 89% of their website traffic, respectively.
The largest age group present on the web are the 35-49 year olds, accounting for over 25% of all UK net users.
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