Source: Facebook Sign In and Homepage | Official WebsiteFacebook CEO and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg announced in an official blog post yesterday that the social network was able to hit one billion active users.
This morning, there are more than one billion people using Facebook actively each month.
If you’re reading this: thank you for giving me and my little team the honor of serving you.
Helping a billion people connect is amazing, humbling and by far the thing I am most proud of in my life.
I am committed to working every day to make Facebook better for you, and hopefully together one day we will be able to connect the rest of the world too.
Facebook’s Road to IPO
In July of this year, Facebook reported that they were able to acquire 955 million active users. On the other hand, it took them longer than expected to reach the one billion mark.
Prior to reaching the 900 million mark, iCrossing’s Senior Analyst Gregory Lyons estimated that Facebook will gain one billion users by August. He even pointed out that India and Brazil could make this possible:
Both are large countries with millions of potential users who have yet to sign up to Facebook. With only 3% of India’s population on Facebook and 16% of Brazil’s (compared to 49% of America’s population or 47% of the UK’s population) countries such as these will clearly contribute heavily to Facebook’s continued growth.
Despite that, having one billion active users is still a big number. In fact, it makes other social media platforms small compared to Facebook. The social network took several years before it was able to reach 100 million active users in 2008, but it continuously gained unstoppable traction from then on.
However, although Facebook remains a social media giant when it comes to number of users, the network began looking vulnerable after releasing their less-than-stellar initial public offering in May.
The network’s stock plunged low last August, going less than $20 for the first time. That is almost half the price it debuted at in May. As a result, Facebook’s market cap is now at around $43 billion, which is a far cry from the over $100 billion valuation that was given before the IPO. However, it is believed that the network is poised to lose revenues as some users are starting to migrate to mobile platforms.
After reaching the one billion milestone, people would definitely wait for Facebook to gain two billion active users. But whether it will become a reality or not remains to be seen.
