Snapchat users now spend 25 to 30 minutes every day on the app

Snapchat's photos and videos are famous for disappearing after a few seconds, but its users are spending as much as a half-hour every day playing with its app.

The company is touting the time users spend on the app in its efforts to lure big brand advertising dollars away from television.

Snapchat is telling potential advertisers that its worldwide daily active users, which at last count stood at more than 100 million, now spend an average of 25-30 minutes a day on Snapchat, a source with knowledge of the pitch told Business Insider.

Of those using it every day, 60% are also creating new content, whether it's a photo or chatting friends, so it's not just people passively watching, Snapchat is telling advertisers.

A Snapchat spokesperson confirmed the numbers.

Much of its advertising push is to compare the app, known mostly for its disappearing photos, crazy filters, and content for millennials, to traditional television. Why? It wants to steal the ad bucks away from traditional TV advertisers.

A Nielsen study commissioned by Snapchat (and also used in its advertising pitch) showed that Snapchat reaches 41% of all 18 to 34-year-olds living in the US. That's in contrast to the top 15 US TV networks that reach only 6% of the same demographic, according to the study.

In order to make itself attractive to the traditional TV spenders, Snapchat has turned to measuring the ads it shows on its app with metrics similar to those used for measuring television advertisements. In February, the company signed a deal with Nielsen to track its ads using GRPs, or gross ratings point, a standard in the advertising industry.

As Snapchat looks to solidify itself as a better alternative to TV ads - and bring in the cash that comes with it - the company has started to embrace the kind of measurements ad buyers need and push the metrics they want to hear.