51% of the World's Population Is Now Online, But Growth Is Slowing, Says Mary Meeker's 2019 Internet Trends Report. It’s taken several decades, but half of the world’s population is now on the Internet, an annual report on internet trends by venture capitalist Mary Meeker said Tuesday. But along with the vast scale of the Internet’s reach comes a slowdown in its growth. The number of people active online last year grew by 6% to about $3.8 billion, or 51% of the world’s total population. In 2017, there were 3.6 billion people online, or 49% of the population.
