The article deals with the issues related to the rethinking the content and the role of communicative competence in the information world. The study of communicative ompetence development specifics of the virtual type becomes an urgent scientific task. In modern society, communication is a determining factor in all social processes, and accordingly, the individual communicative competence becomes its key property, providing the basic level of interrelations necessary to maintain sustainability and social reproduction of this type of development. The increase in the volume of information and the expansion of communication field, strengthening the manipulative effect of modern mass media, the illusion of the advantages of virtual reality over the usual one form a space filled with disorienting symbols and simulacra, in which all informational and communicative pathologies and their consequences are presented. The article describes communicative competence as one of the fundamental personality characteristics and an important element of the virtual communication process. The potential of communicative competence is revealed in the organization of effective network interactions and the formation of virtual culture. The key role of communicative competence in the processes of successful socialization, social adaptation, realization of individual creative potential and self-expression are substantiated.