It depends on what is counted. The Shift Project puts digital technology at 3.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2019 and civil aviation at about 2.5% of these emissions in 2018. Another study (Malmodin et al., 2024) gives 1.4% for digital technology in 2020, with televisions counted separately. For aviation, the industry reports 882 million tonnes of CO2 in 2023, about 2% of human CO2 emissions. These figures do not measure the same thing: the digital figure covers all greenhouse gases, including those from the manufacturing of devices, whereas the aviation industry figure covers only the CO2 from fuel and leaves out the other climate effects of aviation, such as contrails.
Read the source article: Digital carbon footprint statistics for 2026, with sources