There will be more than 20 million men online in the UK in 2009 – 51% of the UK internet user population – according to a new estimate from eMarketer.
More women in the UK continue to go online, said eMarketer, which expects slightly more than 19 million to do so in 2009.
The proliferation of online TV and video offerings, including the BBC iPlayer, has given all UK internet users further incentives to view content on the web, but men have taken more advantage of this, the online research firm said.
Karin von Abrams, senior analyst and author of the report UK Men Online, said: “The arrival of the recession in the UK may have raised internet use more among men than women, because men have shown greater interest in accessing news and financial information on the web.”
She added: “This impulse is all the greater for men who are wage earners, manage their families’ finances, are in danger of losing their jobs or need to find new ones.”
Recent research from Hearst Digital found that more women over 45 are using the internet once a day than those aged between 16 and 24 (see New Research Looks At Women’s Online Habits).
The Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project surveys, published earlier this month, meanwhile, revealed that the internet continues to be populated largely by younger generations in the US, as over half the online population there is between 18 and 44 years old (see Larger percentage of older generations going online in US).
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