The Digital Divide refers to any inequalities between groups, broadly construed, in terms of access to, use of, or knowledge of information technology. The divide inside countries can refer to inequalities between individuals, households, businesses, and geographic areas at different socioeconomic and other demographic levels, while the global designates countries as the units of analysis and examines the divide between developing and developed countries on an international scale.

Conceptualization of the digital divide is often as follows:

Theoretical explanations for the digital divide, or who connects with which attributes: demographic characteristics of connected individuals and their cohorts.
Means of connectivity, or how individuals and their cohorts are connecting and to what: infrastructure, location, and network availability.
Intensity of connectivity, or how sophisticated the usage: mere access, retrieval, interactivity, innovative contributions.
Purpose of connectivity, or why individuals and their cohorts are connecting: reasons individuals are online and uses of the Internet and ICTs.
Lack of connectivity, or why individuals and their cohorts are not connecting.