Microsoft draws global audience

Search engine Google may have larger competition than they originally thought. According to new research from comScore, Microsoft sites drew the most users globally in December.

by Kristina Knight

Microsoft (508 million unique visitors) led Google (494 million unique visitors) for the month of December. But don't count Google down and out by a long shot. The search giant actually showed the most growth for December at a 9% growth rate. Number one site Microsoft showed only 5% growth, as did number three site Yahoo that had 476 million unique visitors.

“Google’s popularity has been driven in part by its international appeal as well as the rapid uptake of some of Google’s applications beyond traditional Web search,” said Bob Ivins, managing director of comScore Europe in a prepared statement. “Examples include the 40-percent year-over-year growth in visitors to Google Image Search, the 71-percent growth in visitors to Gmail, and the 62-percent growth in visitors to Google Maps.”

The Time Warner Network is also in the mix with 260 million unique visitors and EBay rounded out the top five with 251 million.

The top categories for online usage also showed respectable growth in December. Multimedia websites led growth at 37%, while Community websites were a close second at 33%. Email (16% growth), News/Information websites (15% growth) and Games (14% growth) rounded out the top five categories for online usage.