Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that number of households with Internet access totalled 195,100 in 2022, equivalent to 95.8% of the total households, up by 1.2 percentage points year-on-year, showing a further increase in prevalence of Internet use. Among the households with Internet access, 97.9% used mobile network while 91.2% used home broadband. Meanwhile, 72.4% (147,400) of the total households had computer equipment (e.g. tablet, laptop), the same proportion as in 2021.

The Internet penetration rate went up by 1.5 percentage points year-on-year to 90.0%; the penetration was the highest among aged 15-24, at 99.5%, the same as in the previous year. On the other hand, 72.1% of the elderly (aged 65 and above) used the Internet, a rise of 6.8 percentage points, which indicated that technology continued to become integrated into seniors’ lives. For the aged 3-14, 69.0% used the Internet. With respect to the frequency of Internet use, 95.8% of the Internet users were daily users, up by 0.3 percentage points year-on-year; the median daily hours spent online remained steady at 3 hours.

Regarding the purpose of Internet use, most used the Internet for online government services (95.9% of total), communication/social networking (95.2%), online entertainment (81.4%) and information search (78.1%); moreover, the proportion for e-banking / mobile payment (67.1%) continued to rise, up by 6.4 percentage points year-on-year. With the development of e-government, 40.2% of the Internet users used online government services other than for health code purpose; the most commonly used e-government services were “applying for certificates, IDs, subsidies, etc.”, “obtaining public information from government websites or apps”, and “making enquiry about personal data”. In addition, 35.8% of the Internet users shopped online, a total of 204,000, up by 15.6% year-on-year; among the online shoppers, 69.1% purchased clothing, footwear, handbags and accessories, etc., a total of 140,900 (+22.5%); meanwhile, 52.5% bought food and beverages, a total of 107,200 (+46.2%). In the fourth quarter of 2022, the median total online shopping spending was MOP1,700, an increase of 54.5% year-on-year.

The mobile phone penetration rate remained steady year-on-year at 93.8%, while the computer penetration rate rose by 1.1 percentage points to 50.7%.

Survey on Information Technology Usage in the Household Sector for 2022 was conducted in the fourth quarter of 2022 through a supplementary questionnaire of the Employment Survey, to collect data on information technology usage among the population aged 3 and above.