Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has attributed a notable surge in user engagement across Facebook and Instagram to the company’s continued investment in AI technologies. In the second quarter of 2025, AI-enhanced recommendation systems reportedly led to significant improvements in how content is surfaced to users—translating directly into more time spent on Meta’s platforms.
AI Recommendation Systems Boost User Time
Zuckerberg highlighted during Meta’s Q2 earnings call that recent advancements in AI-driven content recommendations are paying off.
“AI is significantly improving our ability to show people content that they’re going to find interesting and useful,” he stated.
The result? A 5% increase in time spent on Facebook and a 6% increase on Instagram in just the past quarter.
Video Content Sees Major Growth
Beyond general user engagement, Meta also reported a 20% year-over-year increase in video viewing time across its platforms. This uptick is attributed to the company’s focus on refining its ranking algorithms and prioritizing more original content on Instagram.
Daily Active Users Climb to 3.4 Billion
Meta’s “family of apps” — which includes Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp — reached a major milestone in June, with over 3.4 billion daily active users, representing a 6% increase from the previous year.
This growth helped push Meta’s total revenue from these platforms to $47.1 billion in Q2, marking a 22% year-over-year increase.
Threads Also Benefits from AI Integration
Meta’s Twitter-like platform, Threads, is also seeing gains in user engagement. The company attributed these increases to the incorporation of large language models (LLMs), which have enhanced how content is personalized and delivered.
Addressing the “AI Slop” Backlash
Despite user concerns over so-called “AI slop”—a term used to describe low-quality, AI-generated content cluttering social feeds—Meta maintains that its AI is becoming more effective. According to the company, improvements in machine learning are helping surface higher-quality, more relevant content that users want to engage with.
What’s Next for Meta’s AI Push?
With measurable gains in time spent, video engagement, and daily users, Meta is likely to continue betting big on AI across all its platforms. The company’s focus seems to be clear: enhance user experience through smarter, more personalized content discovery—and let the numbers speak for themselves.
Sources ( Techcrunch )
