Reddit RDDT and Snap SNAP are leading social media platforms that monetize user engagement through digital advertising. While RDDT is an emerging social media platform, gaining traction with community-driven advertising, Snap focuses on visual messaging, AR experiences and creator content.

Per the Grand View Research report, the global digital advertising market size was valued at $488.4 million in 2024 and is expected to reach $1,164.25 million by 2030, registering a CAGR of 15.4% from 2025 to 2030. Both Reddit and Snap are expected to benefit from this rapid growth pace.

RDDT or SNAP — Which of these Social Media stocks has the greater upside potential? Let’s find out.

Reddit is benefiting from strong user engagement, including rising daily and weekly active users, gains in Average Revenue Per User (ARPU), and the expansion of advertiser tools such as DPA, Reddit Pixel and CAPI.

In the third quarter of 2025, Advertising revenues surged 74% year over year to $549 million, driven by both existing advertisers deepening their investments and a 75% rise in the active advertiser count. This growth highlights Reddit’s ability to attract advertisers across large, mid-market, and small-to-medium-sized businesses.

Reddit’s expanding portfolio has been a major growth driver. In the third quarter of 2025, ARPU grew 41% year over year to $5.04, indicating that portfolio expansions are driving higher monetization per user.

RDDT is also expanding search-led engagement through Reddit Answers. In the third quarter of 2025, over 75 million people searched on Reddit weekly, showcasing the growing popularity of this feature. The company has integrated Reddit Answers into its core search functionality, increasing visibility across conversations and expanding its reach to non-English languages, including Spanish, German, Italian, French, and Portuguese.

Snap is benefiting from strong revenue growth driven by improved advertising demand and the expansion of direct revenue streams. In the third quarter of 2025, Advertising revenues rose 5% year over year to $1.32 billion, driven primarily by growth in Direct Response (DR) advertising revenue, which increased 8% year over year. Growth in DR advertising revenue was primarily driven by strong demand for Pixel Purchase and App Purchase optimizations.

Snapchat has reached a milestone of more than 477 million daily active users, increasing 8% year over year, and monthly active users increased 7% year over year to 943 million in the third quarter of 2025. This growth was driven by the steady adoption of Augmented Reality Lenses, Spotlight, and AI chatbots, which have enhanced user engagement and creativity on the platform.

Snap is also benefiting from increased engagement with its content and augmented reality (AR) features. In the third quarter of 2025, AR engagement remains strong, with more than 8 billion daily uses of AR lenses and 350 million daily active users engaging with AR experiences. New AI-powered lenses, such as the Imagine Lens, have further enhanced user creativity and interaction.

Snapchat’s partnership with Perplexity has been noteworthy. The company recently announced a partnership with Perplexity to integrate its AI-powered answer engine directly into the app’s Chat interface. Starting in early 2026, Snapchat’s nearly 1 billion monthly users will be able to ask questions and get verified, conversational answers powered by Perplexity. This marks Snap’s first major step toward making Snapchat a center for trusted AI-driven discovery and learning.