76% Want Control Over Social Feeds—Not Algorithm Guesswork

It turns out, people prefer their social media to have features that lesser-known “decentralized” social networks, like Bluesky and Mastodon, have. HostingAdvice commissioned a survey of the general U.S. population on social media preferences to provide insight to developers on how they can compete in the top heavy social media industry.

When it comes to social networks, people want control and they want choice. 42% said they would sign up for a social platform that let them “choose between a chronological order and a ‘relevancy’ order that works in accordance with my preset interests.” A further 34% want to fully drive their own experience, selecting “I want full control (toggle filters, ranking models, sources, etc.).” For what it’s worth, men are 47% more likely to want full control over their feed’s algorithm.

Most people (52%) said they are not familiar with decentralized social networks such as Bluesky and Mastodon., which are working towards giving users more control over their social networking experience. I think the word “decentralized” probably isn’t the best way to market a social network, but having it “your way,” as Burger King likes to say, could be a smarter bet.

We found there to be demand and opportunity for decentralized social networks. For starters, more than half of respondents (57%) use three or more social media networks on a weekly basis. A third (33%) are using four or more. Digging deeper, we found that the older the respondent, the fewer social networks they were likely to be using on a weekly basis. There was no significant difference between men and women.

When ranking various reasons why one might be compelled to sign up for a new social network, the top reason was “Less algorithm manipulation and the ability to customize what I see.” The next two most chosen reasons were “No ads or fewer ads” and “It caters to a specific/niche community I am a part of or interested in.”

Every major social network is organized around a feed that displays news and updates from people and entities you follow or are connected with. Some feeds will also show you things it thinks you will like, or things that people you follow are interacting with. Behind every feed is an algorithm, a set of rules to be followed as dictated by the company that operates the platform.

There’s an issue for users who are invested in a social network, though. These algorithms can change at any moment, and companies don’t always disclose exactly what’s in their secret sauce. Since Facebook’s inception of the news feed in 2006, it has had eight major updates.

Instagram and Twitter/X have had a similar number of updates. The thing is, major social media platforms have hundreds of millions of users and investors, public and private, so the updates may not be what many people want.

I asked Christian de Looper, our Consumer Technology Analyst at HostingAdvice, for his thoughts on the survey’s results. He noted, “Anyone over the age of 25 or so has gone through many different social media eras, and having to start over all the time can get exhausting. Decentralizing social media is a great way to get around this.”

“The problem is that there are competing decentralized social media standards, and the concept really only works if all of the major names make use of one standard so that users actually have portability with their data.”

Enter web3 and decentralized social networks. Decentralized means that no single entity owns, controls, or manages all user data, content, or operations. Instead, it’s powered by a distributed network of independent servers or nodes, often using blockchain or federated protocols. The benefits boil down to more user control and privacy.

Two players who have made a name for themselves in this realm are Bluesky and Mastodon, each with millions of users. Both are essentially X competitors, attracting people who want their feed to be based on an algorithm that is different from what X is currently providing.

From a developer perspective, a social platform is probably the last thing you’d want to build, but it’s still early days for decentralized social networks, and demand is growing. You may need to let go of the idea that you need to reach Facebook levels of users to be successful and generate meaningful revenue.

Any app intelligence platform will tell you there are hundreds of successful-in-their-own-right social media apps with tens of thousands of users or more, each with their own monetization strategy.

We use social networks to better connect and keep up with friends, family, work, and other interests. They’re meant to serve us as individuals and communities, but too often, they are driven to keep us engaged in things that are not necessarily meaningful or helpful to us. This survey is only scratching the surface of consumer sentiment on social networking algorithms.

Still, it’s clear that there is demand for new social media platforms that allow each user to have a level of control over what shows up in their feed.

Methodology

In May 2025, we surveyed 1,000 people from the general U.S. population. Ages ranged from 18-80. Males represented 55% of the surveyed audience while females represented 45%. To ensure the integrity of data collection, we employed an array of data quality methods.

Alongside conventional measures such as digital fingerprinting, bot checks, geo-verification, and speeding detection, each response underwent a thorough review by a dedicated team member to ensure quality and contextual accuracy.

For media inquiries, please reach out to adam.blacker@hostingadvice.com.