Mideast Growth on Facebook Rose Sharply In April 2010

The Middle East added about a third more monthly active users to Facebook in April than it did in March, or more than 1 million new users, according to our latest Global Monitor report. Egypt led the charge, sending in some 392,080 new users. As we mentioned last month, the atmosphere actually isn't entirely comfortable for Facebook in the country, with an opposition group called the April 6 Youth Movement using Facebook to organize. The protesters, or at least the visibility they are giving Facebook, could be a significant growth driver; the April 6 Page is now up to 77,345 members. Growth for Saudi Arabia was fairly steady from March to April at 190,340 new MAU. Following Egypt, this is one of the countries in the region with lower penetration, now at 8.6 percent. But both countries seem to be consistently growing now, so that won't be the case for long. Both the United Arab Emirates and Israel are also reliable growers, and added about equal numbers of users in April. As you can see, Israel has a higher penetration and lower growth rate; the country is probably within a few percentage points of reaching its peak penetration. The UAE, though, isn't far behind. Lebanon and Jordan are also neck-and-neck, but we didn't see Lebanon on the list last month, and Jordan's growth more than doubled. Finally, Kuwait also snuck on, despite having a smaller population than any country in the region besides Qatar. Here's the list: The total gain among the seven listed above was 1,114,500, while unlisted countries like Iraq and Oman would add a handful more for the region. As always, this data is sourced from Facebook's advertising tool, which runs at least a few weeks behind. Our full Global Monitor report covers almost 100 countries and includes the metrics you see above, as well as forward projections for every country and region. It's part of our Inside Facebook Gold subscription service.

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Mideast Growth on Facebook Rose Sharply In April 2010

Chris Morrison

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Chris Morrison