Hitwise: Facebook growing fast, MySpace still on top

The good news for Facebook, according to new statistics from Hitwise, is that its traffic is up 50 percent in the U.S. since last August. The not-so-good news for Zuckerberg & pals? The same numbers say that News Corp.'s MySpace still owns a whopping 67.5 percent of the social-networking market in the U.S.

Hitwise gathered its data from an analysis of traffic to 56 different social-networking sites, and concluded that Facebook has gone from a market share of under 14 percent to slightly over 20 percent in the past year. MySpace, meanwhile, has seen a 10 percent decline in visits, which has pulled its share of the sector down from over 75 percent last year. These numbers, however, were tabulated well before this week's launch of MySpace's music service, which may well boost its traffic.

Behind Facebook and MySpace, Hitwise found that the third, fourth, and fifth most popular social networks in the U.S. are MyYearbook, Tagged, and the AOL-owned Bebo. None of them, however, has yet to bring in more than 2 percent of the U.S. market share.

Facebook vs. MySpace traffic comparisons are popular among data firms these days, withComScore announcing in June that Facebook had passed MySpace in traffic for the first time. But much of Facebook's growth is overseas, and everyone seems to be in agreement that MySpace is still the top social network in the U.S.

But Hitwise had some more news that might not be so good for either MySpace or Facebook: Visits to social networks overall were down 17 percent from August 2007 to August 2008.

[Inconnux]

I deleted my facebook acount after they 'redesigned it' and made it look like crap. promptly started a myspace page.

[humanssssss]

I had 6 facebook accounts and have deleted them all. Facebook beacon is stupid and I hate them.

[Galaxy5]

MySpace? Isn't that where the illiterate children with horrid web pages hang out?

[Harrison912]

Thanks, Caroline, for these interesting statistics. I have accounts on both MySpace and FaceBook. I excellerated my usage of FaceBook for the first time this year to socially market my safety and security web site. It's been great interacting with friends and raising awareness for the need to stay a bit safer. <br /> <br />I'm not really liking the new format either but it's not necessarily the format as much as some of the technical issues that are slowing it down and causing frustration for me. <br /> <br />If I had to chose between FaceBook or MySpace, I'd have to say, I much prefer FaceBook for my social interaction.

[knowles2]

This is all good, competition breeds innovation. <br /><br />I have probably got an account on all the sites, but only really used Facebook because nearly all of my friends are on it, plus I can never log into my myspace account, and I also hated the layout of myspace, plus completely rubbish colour scheme people used on their profiles.<br />Facebook keeping the colours the same on each profile seem best.

[RealEstateBlackBook]

Thanks for the info. Personally I love facebook and it's no wonder they are growing so fast. it looks like Myspace is finally doing something to get into the game. We'll see how they end up, especially with their never ending fight against spam.<br /><br />[link title="Real Estate Social media"]http://realestateblackbook.com/blog/social-media/10-ways-to-social-media[/link]