41 Top Visual Content Statistics For 2024 (Latest Data)

Looking for the latest visual content statistics? I’ve got you covered.

Visual content is any content that incorporates visual elements—i.e. images, videos, animations, infographics, and so on. 

In this post, I’ll be sharing the latest data about visual content.

These stats will shed light on how marketers and brands are using visual content in their marketing strategies this year, reveal the latest trends that are shaping the industry, and uncover other interesting insights.

How popular is visual content?

Let’s start with some general visual content statistics that highlight how often consumers, brands, and marketers create and consume visual content this year.

1. Roughly half of marketers say over 50% of their content is now visual

When asked ‘How much of your content contained visuals last year?’, 27.6% of surveyed marketers answered ‘50% and above’, and 21.9% said ‘more than 75%’. 

Combined, that means around 49.5% of marketers use visuals in at least 50%  of the content they produce.

A further 34.3% of surveyed marketers said 20% to 50% of their content contains visuals, while only 16.2% said less than 20%.

Source: Venngage

2. 95.2% of marketers say visual content is important to their marketing strategy

Of those, 23.8% said their content marketing strategies were nothing without visual content, while 56.2% said visuals are very important to their strategy, 29.5% said they’re quite important and 19.1% said somewhat important. 

Only 4.8% of surveyed marketers said visual content was not very important at all.

Source: Venngage

3. 63.3% of marketers revamped their visual content strategy last year

When asked if they pivoted their visual content strategy last year (2023), almost two-thirds of surveyed brands answered ‘yes’. 

Source: Venngage

4. 80% of marketers use images in all their posts on social media 

The days of text-only posts dominating social feeds are long gone. These days, the vast majority of posts shared by brands and their social media marketing teams contain visuals.

Source: Blogging Wizard

5. The global visual content market size reached $5.2 billion last year

And it’s expected to grow to $19.17 billion by 2032 at a CAGR of 15.6%.

Source: Business Research Insights

6. There are over 136 billion images indexed on Google 

The internet is overflowing with visual content. There are at least 136 billion—and that’s a conservative estimate—images indexed on Google according to the latest data we could find, with millions more being added every day.

Source: Photutorial

What are the benefits of visual content?

Now let’s look at some stats that highlight the benefits of visual content for brands, marketers, and consumers.

7. Visual content gets 94% more views than text content

If you use visuals in your content—whether that’s social media posts, blog posts, or anything else—it’s probably going to get significantly more views than if you used text alone. 

Source: Outbrain

8. Visual content is 40x more likely to be shared on social media

Social media statistics show that users prefer to share visual content over text posts. The upshot of this is clear: If you’re aiming for engagement and virality, make sure all your social media posts include eye-catching visuals.

Source: Reusser 

9. Your brain processes visual content 60,000 times faster than text

It’s often said that a picture is worth a thousand words, and this stat suggests there’s a lot of truth in that proverb. You can communicate information much faster through images than text—60,000 times faster, to be precise.

Source: LMC

10. 41% of Gen Z consumers are put off by a lack of images showing the product in use 

According to a recent survey, 41% of consumers in the Gen Z age bracket say they’re less likely to purchase a product if there’s a lack of images showing it being used. That’s more than any other age group.

It’s clear then that including lots of visuals of your products in use could have a positive impact on your conversion rate and ultimately, lead to more sales.

Source: Cloudinary

How do brands create visual content?

Next, let’s look at some statistics that tell us more about how brands go about creating their visual content, and how much time and money they spend on it.

11. 69% of organizations create video content mostly in-house

The majority of businesses make most of the videos they use in their visual content in-house. 

A further 21% say they outsource most of their visual content creation to third parties (i.e. freelancers and agencies), while 8% say most of their content is employee-generated, and 2% say it’s mostly user- or customer-generated.

Source: CMI

12. Over half of all marketers spend over 10 hours a week producing visual content

It looks like a big chunk of the average marketer’s working week is spent creating visuals for their marketing content. 

Over 50% say they spend over 10 hours producing visual content. Of those, 34.3% say they spend 10 to 15 hours and 29.9% say they spend over 20 hours on that task.

A further 22.9% spend 5-10 hours producing visual content, while 13.3% spend 2-5 hours and 9.6% spend less than 2 hours weekly.

Source: Venngage

13. 32.4% of marketers spend over 50% of their budget on visual content

While there’s no doubt that visual content is effective from a marketing standpoint, the downside is that it costs more than other types of content to produce.

Around a third of marketers say they spend over half their total budget—and 22.9% said they spend around 20-50% of their total budget—on visual content.

Source: Venngage

Where do brands share visual content?

After brands have created visual content, where do they post it to reach their target audience? Let’s look at some more statistics to find out…

14. The top distribution platform for visual content is YouTube

When asked what platform they created the most visual content for last year, 47.6% of surveyed marketers said YouTube, making this the #1 distribution platform.

In addition, 39.1% pointed to Instagram, while 35.2% said LinkedIn, 31.4% Facebook, and 26.7% TikTok. 

A further 24.8% said they posted visual content to their own blog, 23.8% said they shared it on their landing pages, and 17.1% said they used it in their print/branding materials.

Source: Venngage

15. 79% of marketers post videos on YouTube

According to data from CMI, 79% of marketers report posting their video content to YouTube. This tallies up with Venngage’s data that suggests Youtube is the top visual content distribution channel.

After YouTube, the next most popular place to post video content according to this dataset is LinkedIn (76%), followed by Facebook (72%), Instagram (71%), X (38%), and TikTok (28%).

Source: CMI

16. 41.9% of brands publish visual content 5-10 times per week

When asked how frequently they publish visual content, ‘5 to 10 times weekly’ was the top response. The second most popular publishing frequency was 2 to 5 times weekly (36.2%)

Only 13.3% of surveyed companies said they published visual content less than twice a week, and only 8.6% did so more than 10 times per week.

Tip: You can stay on top of your social media posting schedule with the help of these social media schedulers. Use them to create, plan, and schedule posts to all your profiles and pages from one place, months in advance. 

Source: Venngage

17. Around 14 billion images are shared on social media every day

Naturally, social media platforms are the most common places for brands and users to share visual content. Over 14 billion images are shared across the social landscape every single day.

Tip: Not sure what kind of images to share on your socials? Check out these winning social media post ideas.

Source: Edge Delta

18. WhatsApp is the top social media platform by images shared daily

YouTube may be the top social media platform to post videos (and visual content generally), but if we look specifically at photos/images, WhatsApp comes out on top. 

Users on WhatsApp share 6.9 billion photos every day. That’s almost 2x more than the second top platform to share images, Snapchat, at 3.8 billion. Facebook ranks third at 2.1 billion and Instagram ranks fourth at 1.3 billion.

Source: Edge Delta

How is AI being used to create visual content?

One of the most transformative trends impacting visual content creation in recent years is the use of generative AI. Here are some stats that reveal more about how brands and marketers are using it…

19. 61.5% of marketers now use AI to produce visual content but…

According to a survey by Venngage from last year, almost two-thirds of marketers said they’re now using AI to produce visual content, while 38.5% said they’re still not using it.

Source: Venngage

20. …only 18% of marketers use AI to create videos

Most marketers may be using AI to create visuals generally but according to CMI, far fewer are using it to make video content specifically. 

This may be due to the simple fact that generative AI tools are not yet sophisticated or accessible enough to create compelling, high-quality video content at scale.

Note though, that there are signs this may be changing, as 17% of those that don’t use AI for video say they have plans to start using it within the next year, and a further 16% say they’ll begin using it within the next 6 months.

Source: CMI

21. 45% of marketers use AI for ideas & inspiration

When asked how they use AI to create content, 45% of surveyed marketers said ‘for ideas and inspiration’, making this the top use case. A further 31% said they use it to create outlines for their content, 18% use it to draft content, and 6% to write content.

Source: HubSpot

22. AI tools save marketers 3 hours per piece of content on average

According to a survey by HubSpot, using AI tools to produce visuals saves marketers 3 hours per piece of content, and 2.5 hours per day overall. What’s more, 84% of marketers using AI say it’s helping them to create content more efficiently.

Source: HubSpot

23. 51.4% of marketers use advanced design software to make their visual content

Marketers aren’t just using AI to make visual content. 51.4% of them are also using advanced design software (like Adobe). What’s more, 50.5% let their in-house designer create their visuals, while 40% use online tools or graphic makers (like Canva or Venngage), and 24.8% outsource the job to a freelance designer. 

Source: Venngage

What challenges do brands face when creating visual content?

24. Marketers rate the difficulty of producing visual content 7 out of 10

Producing high-quality visual content isn’t easy. On average, surveyed marketers rate it a 7 out of 10 for difficulty.

Source: Venngage

25. The top challenge marketers face with visual content is coming up with new ideas

According to data from HubSpot, 16% of marketers say their top challenge is finding ideas for new content. A further 16% say it’s creating content that generates lots of engagement, and 15% say it’s creating content that drives plenty of website traffic. 

Source: HubSpot

26. 50.5% of marketers say they struggle to find the right layout for their visual content

Venngage also asked marketers what their biggest challenge is when producing visual content, and the top response (50.5%) was finding the right layout to use to display their data, copy, etc. 

The next top response was ‘producing engaging visual content consistently’ (43.8%), followed by creating a ‘great design’ (37.1%), and then ‘sourcing data and statistics or writing copy’ (30.5%).

Source: Venngage

27. The biggest challenge marketers face when creating videos is a lack of time

According to a survey from CMI, 69% of marketers say the top barrier they face when producing video content is a lack of time. 56% say their biggest challenge is staying consistent, while 52% say it’s producing enough video content, 43% say the issue is with the human resources required, and 40% point to the cost.

Source: CMI

28. 29.5% of marketers would like to automate the process of adding branding to their visual content

When asked which part of the visual content creation process they’d most like to simplify/automate, 29.5% said ‘applying my branding to visuals automatically’. 

Furthermore, 28.6% said ‘real-time collaboration with members’, 25.7% said ‘auto-generating multiple design types based on content’ (e.g. infographic to report), and 11.4% said ‘visuals automatically reformatted for social media dimensions’.

Source: Venngage

What are the top types of visual content?

What different types of visual content are most popular and effective? Let’s look at some more visual content statistics to find out…

29. ‘Data visualizations’ are the most-used type of visual content

Venngage asked marketers what type of visual content they use most frequently, and 52.2% of respondents pointed to ‘charts & data visualizations’, making this the top response.

What’s more, 46.7% said they used ‘stock photos’, 44.4% said ‘presentations & video’, 42.2% said ‘original graphics’, 18.9% said ‘multi-page documents’, and 15.6% said ‘GIFs and memes’.

Source: Venngage

30. ‘Original graphics’ are the best-performing type of visual content 

The same survey as above asked what types of content marketers thought performed best for them, and 43% pointed to ‘original graphics’ 

The next top response was stock photos (34%), followed by, videos & presentations (33%), charts & data visualizations (31%), multi-page documents (25%), GIFs & memes (11%).

Source: Venngage

31. ‘Stock photos’ are the worst-performing type of visual content

39% of surveyed marketers said stock photos performed the worst of any type of content. However, given that 34% also said stock photos performed the best for them, it seems that stock photos can be hit or miss.

Source: Venngage

32. WebP is the most popular image format

49.5% of brands now use the WEBP format for their images. JPEG is the second most popular image format at 19.9%, while AVIF ranks third at 13.3%. HEIC and PNG both come joint fourth at 8.7% each.

Source: Cloudinary

33. AVIF is the fastest-growing image format

Only 0.4% of brands used AVIF for images as of October 2021. That shot up to 13.3% as of August 2023, making this the fastest-growing image format.

Meanwhile, WEBP dropped from 60% to 49.5% across the same period, while JPEG went down from 27.4% to 19.8%.

Source: Cloudinary

What about video content?

Video is a specific type of visual content that’s become more and more important in recent years. Before we wrap up, here are some stats specifically about video content.

34. 50% of marketers now use video in their content marketing strategy…

Video is the top media format marketers are leveraging this year, with 50% including it as part of their content mix. 

Images come second, with 47% of marketers using it in their content mix, while blog posts rank third at 33%. Infographics—another type of visual content—came fourth at 30%.

Source: HubSpot²

35. 67% of marketers say video content has become more important in the last year

CMI asked marketers whether or not they thought video content had become more important last year. 67% said yes, while 32% said it stayed the same level of importance. Only 1% said video marketing became less important. 

Source: CMI

36. ‘Social media videos’ are the most common type of video content brands use

77% of organizations surveyed by CMI said they use social media videos in their marketing campaigns, making this the most popular type of video.

A further 61% said they use branded stories (i.e. short films and documentaries), while 59% said they use how-to or explainer videos, and 54% said they use interviews with influencers 

Source: CMI

37. …and the video type that produces the ‘best’ content marketing results

54% of marketers also said social media videos produce the best results of any marketing video. 

The next top-voted video type in the survey was case studies/testimonial videos (51%), followed by how-to videos/explainers (48%) and branded stories (44%).

Source: CMI

38. 17% say short-form video content is the marketing trend that’s generated the best results

One of the clearest trends over the last few years has been the shift to short-form video. Ever since TikTok launched, bite-sized videos under a minute long have become an increasingly important part of the social media landscape.

So unsurprisingly, 17% of marketers said it was the trend that had generated the best results for them in a recent survey from HubSpot, making it the top response. A further 13% said the trend that had generated the best results was ‘content showing brand values’. 

Short-form also ranked as the #1 video format with the highest ROI.

Source: HubSpot

39. Use of long-form videos grew 11,000% over the past decade

Short-form video may be the format that’s getting the most attention recently, but long-form is the fastest-growing video segment, with usage up 11,000% over the last decade according to data from HubSpot.

Source: HubSpot²

40. 91% of consumers say they want to see brands share more online videos

Consumers love video content and want to see more of it. A whopping 91% of them say they’d like to see brands produce more online videos.

Source: HubSpot³

41. The average internet user watches 17 hours of video content weekly

Internet users spend a huge chunk of their online time consuming video content every week, which is why video content has become such an important component of effective digital marketing.

Source: HubSpot³

Final thoughts

That concludes our roundup of the top visual content marketing statistics for 2024.

As these stats show, the creation and consumption of visual content has increased dramatically over the last decade, and it’s now an essential part of any content marketing strategy.

In particular, video content is going to be increasingly important over the next few years, and developments in generative AI are making it easier for brands and marketers to produce this type of content.

Hungary for more statistics? You might want to check out our roundups of the latest lead gen statistics, YouTube Shorts statistics, and influencer marketing statistics.