World Map of Social Networks

A map of the world, showing the most popular social networks by country, according to Alexa & Google Trends for Websites traffic data* (December 2009).
Please share and help me to improve it with your comments !

Grab the embedding code

Some visible changes to highlight from June map (see below):

- Facebook continues its colonization of the world with more than 350 millions users. Since June Facebook conquered new territories from its competitors (in 100 out of 127 countries analyzed it is market leader). In particular:
- From Orkut (Google): India. Caution: data based on Alexa only, because Google doesn’t provide Orkut traffic data. It could be interesting to understand if these two social networks are mirroring social class divisions.
- From Hi5: Cameroon, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua. Hi5 resists in Peru, Portugal, Romania, Thailand and Mongolia
- From Odnoklassniki: Azerbaijan only. It seems that Facebook hasn’t found a good strategy to convince Russian people that still prefer Odnoklassniki and V Kontakte.
- From Maktoob: Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Yemen
- From Cyworld: South Korea
- From Lidé: Czech Republic
- From Skyrock: Guadeloupe and Martinique

I’ve added to the map: Cuba, Qatar, Reunion
I’ve deleted Iran because censorship situation doesn’t allow me to get reliable data. If you have any insight please help me.

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A map of the world, showing the most popular social networks by country, according to Alexa & Google Trends for Websites traffic data* (June 2009). Please share and help me to improve it with your comments !

Grab the embedding code

Top 3 Social Networking Sites:

Some visible patterns to highlight:

- Facebook has almost colonized Europe and it’s extending its domination with more than 200 millions users
- QQ, leader in China, is the largest social network of the world (300 millions active accounts)
- MySpace lost its leadership everywhere (except in Guam)
- V Kontakte is the most popular in Russian territories
- Orkut is strong in India and Brazil
- Hi5 is still leading in Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and other scattered countries such as Portugal, Mongolia, Romania
- Odnoklassniki is strong in some former territories of the Soviet Union
- Maktoob is the most important Arab community/portal

Other country specific social networks:

- Iwiw in Hungary
- Nasza-klasa in Poland
- Cyworld in South Korea
- Friendster in Philippines
- Hyves in Netherlands
- Lidé in Czech Republic
- Mixi in Japan
- One in Lithuania
- Draugiem in Latvia
- Wretch in Taiwan
- Zing in Vietnam

________

* Data based on Alexa & Google Trends for Website results:

- “Alexa’s traffic rankings are based on the usage patterns of Alexa Toolbar users and data collected from other, diverse sources over a rolling 3 month period. A site’s ranking is based on a combined measure of reach (unique Alexa users who visit a site on a given day) and pageviews (the total number of Alexa user URL requests for a site).”

- “Google Trends for Websites shows you a graph reflecting the number of daily unique visitors”

295 Responses to “World Map of Social Networks”

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1 gianluca giu 7th, 2009 at 8:51 pm

complimenti davvero per l’idea, che dà molti spunti…australiani popolo di fotografi? i russi autarchici? myspace sempre meno concorrenziale?

se hai tempo, mi farebbe piacere conoscere qualcosa di più sulle variabili statistiche di cui tiene conto la mappa.

buona serata, gianluca
2 nebben giu 7th, 2009 at 11:59 pm

Found this map very interesting, especially as it relates to Africa. Penned my thoughts & findings here http://bit.ly/akyiR.
3 vincos giu 8th, 2009 at 9:10 am

@gianluca anzitutto grazie, ho aggiornato la pagina mettendo in basso la metodologia utilizzata da Alexa e Google
4 vincos giu 8th, 2009 at 10:57 am

@nebben I agree with your interesting thoughts, thanks for adding value to my map !
5 sacha giu 8th, 2009 at 12:32 pm

ottimo lavoro Vincenzo. Ora che l’ha ripresa pure techrunch (davvero complimenti!) ti toccherà rispondere alle decine di commenti che sono già stati postati al post che la riportava
6 Nurul Alam Masud giu 8th, 2009 at 1:04 pm

It’s cool. I agreed with the world map of social networking.
7 Giacomo Ratta giu 8th, 2009 at 1:27 pm

Veramente un bel lavoro! Molto originale e, presumo, anche molto faticoso.
Complimenti per la presenza su TechCrunch. Non è da tutti…
8 Frank Thomas giu 8th, 2009 at 7:21 pm

Nice work. But using Alexa data means that you favour technology-oriented people in your map. Alexa data are bisaised and you might mention that.

To better understand your map I am interested to know: how did you put the Alexa and the Google Trend data together ? Where do the data from both sources coincide and where not, and why?

And the most intersting question: what is the reason behind the differences ? I wrote a paper with Nicoletta Vittadini on cultural differences in web2.0 usage. And we think the reasons are cultural differences, amongst other influences :
http://www.slideshare.net/ftr_/thomas-vittadini-gomez-united-in-diversity-web20-and-european-and-national-cultures-in-europe

Interesting work. Thanks

- Frank
9 Patrick giu 8th, 2009 at 8:46 pm

Interesting data. Not shocked at all by my own country’s penchant for Friendster but I’m a bit surprised with regards to MySpace’s position. Is it really THAT unpopular now?

A better color palette could have been used though for the benefit of people with a bit of color-blindness, like me.
10 audrey giu 9th, 2009 at 1:32 am

Those are the top 3 social networks from different countries? I don’t even know some of them. Thanks for the list.
11 Jürgen Hösch giu 9th, 2009 at 10:31 am

Interesting map – but what I miss is some info about the criteria for social networks. In my opinion you are missing classmates and stayfriends as important networks for the countries USA, Canada, Germany, France, Sweden, Austria and Switzerland.
12 Luca giu 9th, 2009 at 12:05 pm

ottimolavoro vincos,
avresti mica una tabella con i dati restituiti in traffico? sarebbe interessante provarea visualizzare i dati anche in termini assoluti (magari con le dimensioni dei paesi). In pratica provare a rispondere alla domanda quant’è il QQ cinese rispetto a FB?
13 vincos giu 9th, 2009 at 4:14 pm

@Frank Thank you for your questions. Let me try to answer:
I didn’t mix the sources, but I’ve compared Alexa data with the Google Trends for Websites. They’ve always coicided in absolute terms (my interest was limited to the ranking).
The 3rd question is more complex and I will answer after reading your study
Thank you
14 vincos giu 9th, 2009 at 4:16 pm

@Patrick you’re right about the colours but Many Eyes has that palette only
15 vincos giu 9th, 2009 at 4:16 pm

@Audrey Yes !
16 vincos giu 9th, 2009 at 4:20 pm

@Jurgen I didn’t miss them, the fact is that they are not in the top 3 list (in terms of traffic)
17 vincos giu 9th, 2009 at 4:22 pm

@Luca
Non ho una tabella di dati nel senso che per brevità ho soltanto individuato la classifica dei social network più trafficati, badando solo al dato relativo.
Però col tempo sarebbe da fare
18 Ilja giu 9th, 2009 at 5:00 pm

Nice to see, I dont mind seeing MySpace out of the picture, horror pages

There is a typo in the bit about “Other country specific social networks:”

- Hives in Netherlands.

Should be

-Hyves in Netherlands
19 boni giu 9th, 2009 at 5:08 pm

why the list does not sohw Twitter?
20 vincos giu 9th, 2009 at 5:24 pm

@Ilja Thanks…updated !

@boni Twitter traffic is not so high compared to other sns
21 Dv0rsky giu 10th, 2009 at 10:15 am

great visualization, thanks!
22 Hartmut Rast giu 10th, 2009 at 11:18 am

Knowing that the population in Africa will continually grow up to 900 million inhabitants it’s quite confusing to me that their shouldn’t still exist any remarkable social networks meanwhile. Therefore, the only conclusion is either they aren’t delivering any sophisticated data or sorry, to write that, your world map has been published to early without including Africa. Hartmut Rast, London
23 vincos giu 11th, 2009 at 10:09 am

@Hartmut thank you for your feedback, the fact is that maybe Alexa/Google don’t have enough data about Africa.
You can read an interesting post here http://societrends.com/2009/06/07/the-offline-continent/
24 cibbuzz giu 11th, 2009 at 1:12 pm

articolo davvero interessante l’ho condiviso su oknotizie e penso lo posterò anche sul mio sito http://www.cibbuzz.com
25 andrea giu 11th, 2009 at 9:44 pm

ho forti dubbi sulla “classifica” dei social-sites nei paesi russofoni…
1) e’ assai improbabile che Vkontakte superi Odnoklassniki come diffusione. Non c’e’ praticamente nessuno sotto i 50 anni in Russia che non abbia un profilo su Odnoklassniki.
2) che cos’e’ LiveJournal al terzo posto?? mai sentito nominare in Russia!
3) credo che manchi al terzo posto (o al secondo) il gigantesco database Znakomstva.ru che e’ collegato al portale Mail.ru; questo database in realta’ si trova sotto nomi diversi in centinaia di portali russofoni (znakomstva.ru, mamba.ru, mromance.ru, love.ru, ecc) ed e’ diffuso anche nei paesi baltici
26 Kelly Brown giu 12th, 2009 at 10:29 pm

The article is ver good. Write please more
27 glow giu 13th, 2009 at 4:08 pm

A very interesting map indeed.
I would only like to add that the the link for One in Lithuania should end in .lt – the .lv is the branch in Latvia.
28 vincos giu 13th, 2009 at 5:42 pm

@glow You’re right, my mistake thanks
29 vincos giu 13th, 2009 at 5:49 pm

@Andrea grazie mille dei tuoi feedback, provo a rispondere

1) i miei sono dati di traffico, non di iscrizione, comunque potrebbe essere in atto un processo di test di Vkontakte da parte degli utenti di Odnoklassniki
2) LiveJournal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiveJournal
3) il database Znakomstva.ru collegato al portale Mail.ru mi risulta non avere caratteristiche di social network (come definito dalla letteratura, vedi Boyd-Ellison http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol13/issue1/boyd.ellison.html), fammi sapere se ti risulta diversamente
30 KattyBlackyard giu 15th, 2009 at 4:51 am

The article is usefull for me. I’ll be coming back to your blog.
31 Lam SEO giu 16th, 2009 at 2:45 am

Zing (in Vietnam) is a portal rather than a social networking site, I think. So what are the criteria of a SNS this map uses?
32 Student Talk giu 22nd, 2009 at 10:04 am

Thank you for sharing. Student Talk, Students Social Network Community and Utility that Help Students Socialize Around the world for Teacher Education and Meet, Exchange and Share Essays, Graphic Designs, Presentations, PowerPoint Projects. Students Looking to Educate in School College University Organization Institute Association, Totally Educational.
33 Folke Lemaitre giu 22nd, 2009 at 1:11 pm

Where is Netlog on the map?

Netlog has almost 50.000.000 members, so should definitely be mentioned here.

Netlog is alot bigger than many of the other social networks listed here.
34 Pampo Reyes Aceves lug 7th, 2009 at 7:34 pm

In México, according to alexa.com, MetroFlog is the 5th most visited site, over yahoo, This social network is still the most used, in the majority of population. Very recently facebook had been displayed over hi5 in charts, but facebook is considered for higher class social level of population
35 Ivar Yuste lug 12th, 2009 at 12:00 pm

Congratulations for the map.

I think this is soon going from social into business. I work in the hotel sector myself and see a lot of networks starting in real estate and now in the hotel B2B sector: http://www.develhotel.com is a good example.

Keep the good work.

Ivar
36 Rolando Peralta lug 24th, 2009 at 6:09 pm

great post! thanks for sharing! I’m subscribing now to your blog.
Just for confirmation, Hi5 is still the most popular Social Network in El Salvador, Central America, followed really close by Facebook because of the huge buzz around it all over the country.
cheers,
37 yuyibin ago 30th, 2009 at 8:42 am

Thank you for you map which help me with my job.What i want to say is the 3rd social network is kaixin001 but not 51 now.The 1st and 2rd is QQ and Xiaonei.
The Website:www.kaixin001.com
38 Izabela set 3rd, 2009 at 3:22 pm

Please, write more. The article is very good .
39 fen bilgisi set 7th, 2009 at 11:41 am

Thanks !!!
40 Sağlık set 16th, 2009 at 12:42 am

very nice topic, thanks..
41 free software set 18th, 2009 at 9:15 pm

it is very useful, thanks.
42 harboot set 23rd, 2009 at 7:23 am

Indonesia??
43 Tom C set 28th, 2009 at 5:14 am

Great work here. Interesting point you made about myspace losing leadership everywhere except Guam. Wonder what the map looks like if you track growth.
44 Merijn set 29th, 2009 at 9:31 am

Nice work, but QQ is hardly a social networking website, and neither is Zing. One is a website for an IM program like ICQ, the other is a news portal. The #1 in China is Xiaonei, #1 in Vietnam is Facebook.

The dominance of Facebook worldwide is staggering. Last time I checked, Facebook was #1 in over 80 countries!
45 bayilik ott 14th, 2009 at 9:33 pm

Very useful map.It will help social media planners.Thanks.
46 hoca ott 29th, 2009 at 3:49 am

In México, according to alexa.com, MetroFlog is the 5th most visited site, over yahoo, This social network is still the most used, in the majority of population. Very recently facebook had been displayed over hi5 in charts, but facebook is considered for higher class social level of population
47 raffa nov 19th, 2009 at 10:40 pm

Veramente un bel articolo, ma che ne dici di proporre una lista dei nuovi social network come ok/no http://oknotizie.virgilio.it/malegria/profile
o come dudu http://www.godudu.com
48 vincos nov 20th, 2009 at 6:54 pm

@raffa buon idea ma manca il tempo
49 Frank Denis nov 23rd, 2009 at 9:46 pm

How come Ning isn’t on that list? Must be a bad joke…
50 FloydThreepwood nov 25th, 2009 at 6:14 pm

I don’t think Facebook is the #1 in Germany. Problem is here that VZ-Group (studivz, meinvz, schuelervz) is much more concerned about privacy. whereas you can find people on Facebook via google, the VZ-Group hides them from not registered users. By this Facebook comes to a higher ranking, because it uses Google as an entry point for different sites in their network but this is just a SEO statistic.
51 Branavan Ganesan nov 30th, 2009 at 9:45 pm

This is a great article and has some very valuable insights.

I’m delighted to see you making use of ManyEyes. As developerWorks, we should be taking more advantage of the fact that we host ManyEyes on alphaWorks and do more data visualization.

I’m interested in the questions that Frank asked around the reasons for the differences. Will look forward to your thoughts on it.

Branavan
52 vincos dic 1st, 2009 at 4:29 pm

@Frank unfortunately Ning is not as visited as Facebook. But if you have useful data please let me know ! Thank you

@FloydThreepwood thank you for your insight

@Branavan thank you for your comment. I’m planning to update my map soon using Many Eyes (It would be useful to have the ability to choose the colours of the territories).
53 Davide Mendolia dic 21st, 2009 at 5:40 pm

Hi, Why for spain, Tuenti is not on the graph ?
54 waqas dic 22nd, 2009 at 12:49 pm

thanks for it
it is really amazing and interesting
55 David dic 31st, 2009 at 11:14 am

Ciao Vincenzo, complimenti la mappa è veramente ben fatta
56 vincos dic 31st, 2009 at 8:17 pm

grazie David !
57 Julia gen 26th, 2010 at 1:36 pm

Hi everyone!

This map is really great!
It just has a little mistake regarding the network in Germany. According to a recent study (http://www.compass-heading.de/cms/tag/vz-gruppe/ if you can speak german.. ) the VZGruppe is still the leading social network with 15,3 million users while Facebook remains on the 2nd place with 11 million users.
So congrats to this really good idea of mapping the social networks! Keep it going!
58 Michele Russo gen 28th, 2010 at 1:19 pm

What do You Think of Viadeo.com as Emerging Professional Social Network? How is it going to? Thank you for all comments!
59 Muriel feb 4th, 2010 at 12:59 pm

Hi,
I am missing Linkedin on the world map, is there a specific reason for it? I think it’s quite big, they say themselves that they have 55 million members over more than 200 countries..
60 vincos feb 4th, 2010 at 7:55 pm

@Muriel it’s not bigger than FB
61 Andrea feb 5th, 2010 at 12:32 pm

Molto interessante, complimenti. Ma non vedo Linkedin. Mi risultano esserci 30 milioni di utenti al mondo, come mai non appare?
62 vincos feb 5th, 2010 at 4:25 pm

@Andrea LinkedIn è sempre sotto FB in tutti i paesi