Facebook is now the sixth most popular Web site in the world with 275 million visitors in February, a 175 percent increase over the previous year, according to comScore.
Facebook has experienced strong growth in Europe, where the site has seen a 314 percent increase to nearly 100 million visitors.
Along with its growing audience, its users are also highly engaged spending an average of three hours per month on the site. One year ago, Facebook usage accounted for 1.1 percent of all minutes spent online in Europe, but by February 2009 that number had increased to 4.1 percent of all minutes. Facebook also accounts for a full 30.4 percent of minutes spent in the social networking category, up from 12.3 percent a year earlier.
Facebook has become the most popular social network in the majority of countries in Europe recently. Of the 17 European countries that comScore analyzed, Facebook held the top position in 11 of them.
The site’s largest audience is in the U.K. with 22.7 million visitors (up 75% compared to a year ago), followed by France with 13.7 million visitors (up 518%) and Turkey with 12.4 million visitors (year ago data not available).
Most recently, Facebook landed the top spot in Spain in February with 5.7 million visitors, representing a significant tenfold increase versus a year ago. It has also surged in Italy, growing 2,700 percent to 10.8 million visitors.
“Facebook has very quickly taken a leading position across most of the European social networking market despite having a strong foothold in just a few European countries one year ago,” said Mike Read, comScore Managing Director of Europe.
“Over the course of the past year, it has climbed the rankings in virtually every market and taken over the top position in several. Most recently, Facebook grabbed the top position in Spain after nipping at the heels of a leading local player for the past several months.”
