Just how many of us have a Facebook account in the world? To even think about it you know the number is going to be astronomical; the question is “who doesn’t have a Facebook account?”  By December 2009, Facebook single handedly attracted 469 million visitors, putting them at the No.4 most viewed website in the world.  Sound like just a number to you?  More than 31 million people signed onto Facebook in December 2009 then in November – Yahoo had 31 million viewers in the entire year of 2009.  That’s right, Facebook had that many hits in just thirty-one days.  The social networking site is quickly climbing the ladder to becoming the third largest Web property in the world (booting out Yahoo as number three, and closely behind Google (No.1) and Microsoft (No. 2)).

All in all, Facebook has grown by almost 250 million viewers in 2009.  If Facebook continues to attract this number of people, it will surely pass Yahoo as the third most viewed website in the world by the end of 2010.  But how many viewers does it need to take on the No.2 and No.1 websites? To pass Microsoft, Facebook would need well over 727 million hits worldwide, and Google of 899 million viewers, which may take more time then the 11 months left to 2010.

On the other hand, Facebook surpasses both Yahoo and Microsoft in many other aspects.  For example, Facebook’s page views grew an estimated 141% last year to 193 billion in December, Yahoo only received 100 billion while Microsoft pulled in 109 billion.  Although Facebook passed these two head honchos, Google still holds the top spot for 274 billion a month. When all’s said and done, Facebook is making exceptional growth in today’s market of most viewed websites. So keep checking out your friends, updating your status and pictures, and let’s move Facebook to the number three spot!