One in five Americans don't use the Internet

Yeah, it might seem like everyone is connected to the net. But here’s a startling reality: 22% of Americans don’t use the internet. And that’s a number that doesn’t seem to be changing.

In June 1995, only 14% of the United States public accessed the internet. Over the next ten years, internet adoption continued its inexorable path to dominance. Since 2005, however, the rate of adoption has been much, much slower, actually oscillating up and down about 4%. For the past three years, the percentage of United States adults who access the internet has repeatedly peaked to between 79% and dropped off to 74%. This pattern doesn’t seem to be changing.

Pew did find that the numbers correlated strongly with age, education and income level. however, unlike previous studies, internet usage doesn’t seem to be affected as much by minority status. Minorities are now almost as likely to use the internet at any given income bracket as non-minorities.

It should come as no surprise that senior citizens account for much of the population that doesn’t use the internet. Nor should it be a surprise that the reason half of those without internet access gave as to why is because they felt that the internet isn’t relevant to them.

Pew has prepared a comprehensive report on their findings (you can read it here or download it as a PDF here). It is an interesting read. One of the major things that they note is that the move towards mobile is driving adoption even when internet access through broadband is limited. If you are at all interested in this kind of thing, you should give it a read.

Pew Research Center Publications