Digital Da’wah as Informal Islamic Education: Reconfiguring Religious Learning among Muslim University Students in Indonesia

Abstract

The expansion of social media has transformed the ways in which young Muslims encounter, access, and engage with Islamic knowledge. In Indonesia, digital da’wah has increasingly extended beyond conventional religious institutions and entered the everyday digital lives of Muslim youth, including university students. This study examines how digital da’wah functions as a form of informal Islamic education and how it reconfigures religious learning among Muslim university students at Universitas Islam Negeri Sultan Maulana Hasanuddin (UIN SMH) Banten. Employing a qualitative case study approach, the study draws on in-depth semi-structured interviews with 18 Muslim undergraduate students who actively engage with Islamic content through social media platforms. The interviews explore students’ experiences in encountering digital da’wah, selecting religious sources, evaluating the credibility of Islamic messages, interpreting religious content, and incorporating acquired knowledge into their everyday religious practices. The findings indicate that students engage with digital da’wah through five interconnected processes: encountering, selecting, evaluating, interpreting, and applying Islamic knowledge. The interviews show that students do not passively accept digital religious messages; rather, they select content according to its relevance and perceived credibility, compare different sources and interpretations, and relate online religious knowledge to their prior learning before selectively incorporating it into everyday religious practices. At the same time, students encounter challenges concerning religious authority, the credibility of online sources, algorithmic exposure, and the simplification of complex Islamic teachings into short and highly consumable content. The study further demonstrates that digital da’wah occupies an increasingly important position between communication and education: it communicates Islamic teachings while simultaneously creating informal spaces in which young Muslims develop religious understanding. By focusing on students at UIN SMH Banten, this study contributes to scholarship on Islamic communication and education by highlighting how digital da’wah reshapes everyday practices of religious learning within a local Indonesian Muslim educational context