News Influencers

More Germans are informing themselves through social media. According to the 2025 ARD/ZDF Media Study, approximately 44 million people in Germany access one or more social media platforms on a weekly basis. They spend an average of 99 minutes daily on these platforms—a figure that continues to rise. For 14 percent of the population, social media has become the primary source of news.

This shift is most pronounced among those aged 14 to 29. Within this age cohort, social media has already become the dominant source of information: one in two young people follow current events primarily through their feeds. Seventeen percent report relying exclusively on social media for information about global events.

WhatsApp, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok constitute the five most widely used platforms in Germany. These platforms shape what people see, read, and discuss. Alongside these dominant players stand smaller but influential niche platforms—including Spotify, Twitter/X, and Telegram—that maintain presence through distinctive formats or targeted audiences.

Digital media transformation has fundamentally altered not only how people consume news, but also the ownership structures of the media landscape itself. Online, forms of journalism emerge that would be unthinkable offline: operations without transparent owner identification, editorial work conducted from jurisdictions outside German regulatory reach, and organizational structures that resist verification. Simultaneously, journalistic content increasingly appears in personalized form: individual creators rather than institutional newsrooms have become the primary focus.

Beyond traditional media brands, new actors have gained substantial influence. Small teams operating infotainment formats or alternative, sometimes right-aligned content succeed in building large audiences. The familiar dual system of public and private broadcasting has replicated itself online: public broadcasting content networks such as Funk (ARD/ZDF) and commercial networks such as Studio71 (ProSiebenSat.1) maintain prominent presences.

The Media Ownership Monitor Germany maps ownership and opinion power across the German-language social media landscape. The research is grounded in analysis of a representative selection of 15 influencer profiles, all with explicit connections to news or current affairs content. These accounts were selected based on their reach across platforms including Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, and X, as well as their demonstrated relevance to specific audience demographics. The goal is to make visible the dynamics and trends shaping digital opinion formation—and thereby to better understand who shapes public debate online in contemporary Germany.