Around 8 million UK adults have never used the Internet, which amounts to just over 16% of the adult population in the country.
That number fell by 299,000 during the three months up to September, a much larger decrease than the previous quarter’s drop of 12,000 people.
These figures come from the Office for National Statistics’ Internet Access Quarterly Update, which estimates internet users and non-users through the third quarter of 2011 and links that information to demographics such as age, location and disability.
The decline in non-use is most pronounced among adults aged 75 and over: around 164,000 more people in that age group began using the web since the prior quarter.
The ONS report also shows that men are slightly more likely to use the Internet than women. It finds that about 4.25 million non-users identify as disabled, representing just over half of all adults who do not use the internet.
Globally, internet adoption continues to rise. The Internet and Mobile Association of India reported that roughly 112 million people in India were using the internet at the time, with projections suggesting continued growth that could see India overtake the United States as the largest internet market within a few years.
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