Internet Usage Surges in Asia-Pacific Region

Internet users in Asia have jumped to 657 million as of March 31, 2009, according to a report by the European Travel Commission's New Media Trend Watch.

Quoting statistics from the Internet World Stats, an international website that features up-to-date world Internet usage, the report said that this latest figure is an increase of 474.9 percent compared to 2000.

Among the top Internet users in Asia as of April 2009 are China with 298 million (or 22.4 percent of the country's population), Japan with 94 million (73.8 percent), India with 81 million (7.1 percent), and South Korea with 36.8 million (76.1 percent).

Indonesia leads the south-east Asian countries with 25 million (10.5 percent) and followed by Vietnam with 20.9 million (24.4 percent) and the Philippines with 20.6 million (21.5 percent).

In May 2007, there were nearly 284 million people aged 15 or older who accessed the Internet from either a home or work computer in the Asia-Pacific region, according to the report.

"The average person in the Asia-Pacific region visited the Internet on 13.8 days in the month and spent 20.2 hours viewing 2,171 pages," it added.

Compared to the global average of 17.1 usage days per month, 25.2 hours per month, and 2,519 pages per month, Asia-Pacific Internet usage is considered to be "somewhat lower than the rest of the world".

Statistics also show that Yahoo! Sites are the most popular in the region overall. In April 2008, Google Sites led the region of all searches conducted with 39.1 percent, followed by Yahoo! Sites with 24 percent and China's Baidu.com with 16.7 percent, said the report quoting statistics from comScore.

To view the complete report, visit New Media Trend Watch.