According to comScore, the online population around the world continues to see healthy growth as the number of people (over the age of 15) who used in Internet in January climbed to 747 million – a 10% increase from the same period in 2006. Not surprisingly, the biggest gains were posted in India, Russia and China where the population jumped 33%, 21% and 20% respectively. China is now the second largest online community in the world with 86.8 million users while the number of U.S. users rose 2% to 153.4 million.
The most time spent online belongs to Canadians (must be the eight months of winters we have to suffer through!) where the average user surfed the Web for 39.6 hours in January (41.3 hours if you just look at broadband users). What’s perhaps most interesting is the comScore numbers don’t include people who accessed the Web using a mobile device. While this population may not be significant now, you have to believe it will be a major component of online usage in the next few years so it will be interested to see if mobile Web surfing leads to a pop in the online population.
If numbers tell the story, here’s a couple of charts to chew on.
Top 15 Countries by Internet Penetration
Jan-06Â Â Â Jan-07Â Â Â % Change
(000) Change
Worldwide         676,878 746,934    10%
United States    150,897  153,447      2%
China                 72,408   86,757     20%
Japan                 51,450   53,670      4%
Germany            31,209   32,192    3%
United Kingdom  29,773   30,072      1%
South Korea       24,297   26,350      8%
France               23,712   24,560    4%
India                 15,867   21,107    33%
Canada              18,332  20,392     11%
Italy                  15,987  18,106    13%
Brazil                 12,845  14,964   16%
Spain          12,206 12,710        4%
Russian        10,471 12,707      21%
Top 15 Online Properties Worldwide
Unique Visitors
(000)
Worldwide     746,934
Microsoft Sites  510,320
Google Sites     502,464
Yahoo! Sites    467,832
Time Warner   262,413
eBay               248,854
Wikipedia Sites 189,003
Amazon Sites   149,817
Fox Interactive 139,821
CNET Networks 118,717
Digital Media Bulletin » Internet Users Top 747 People Worldwide
[...] Another interesting factoid from Comscore: Canada was number one in terms of average hours online per visitor, at 39.6 hours. Broadband Canadian users were slightly higher at 41.3 hours per month. One blogger says it’s the cold Canadian nights… hmm possible. As one of the Comscore’s representatives said “broadband connections stimulate usage”. [...]