Facebook Hits 1 Billion Active Users, Releases Stats, User Characteristics [Median Age Falls]

This morning Facebook announced that it had passed 1 billion active monthly users – an impressive number by any measure. Here are are the lastest user stats from Facebook:

Facebook
reached 1 billion monthly active users on September 14 at 12.45 PM Pacific time. Since
Facebook launched:

• Over 1.13 trillion likes since launch in February
  2009
• 140.3 billion friend connections
• 219 billion photos uploaded
  • Data was pulled on 9/10/2012, and represents the total # of photos
    currently on this site – in other words, it excludes deleted photos.  If
    we wanted to include all photos ever uploaded, the estimate we have is 265
    billion. Photo uploading launched fall 2005.
  • Includes location-tagged posts as well as check-ins.
    Data was pulled 9/10/2012, and represents total location-tagged posts &
    check-ins since launch of the product in August 2010
  • Data
    was pulled on 9/11/2012, and represents song plays since the launch of
    music-listening applications in September 2011

• 17 billion location-tagged posts, including check-ins

• 62.6 million songs have been
  played 22 billion times – that’s about 210,000 years of music

Characteristics of users joining the
week Facebook hit 1B

• The median age of the user is about
  22
• The top five countries where people connected
  from at the time we reached this milestone were Brazil, India, Indonesia, Mexico
  and the United States (NOTE: in alphabetical order)
• Facebook now has 600M mobile users

Characteristics of users joining the
week Facebook hit 500M users (July 2010)

• The median age of the user at that
  time was about 23
• Top five countries where people connected
  from at the time we reached this milestone were Brazil, India, Indonesia,
  Mexico, and the United States (NOTE: in alphabetical order)
• Users signing up at this time now
  have an average of 305 friends

Characteristics of users joining the
week we hit 100M (August 2008)

• The median age of the user at that
  time was about 26
• The top five countries where people
  connected from at the time we reached this milestone were Chile, France,
  Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States (NOTE: in alphabetical order)
• The user signing up at this time now
  has an average 334 friends

Characteristics of users joining the
week Facebook hit 50M users (October 2007)

• The median age of the user signing
  up at this time was about 26
• Top five countries where people
  connected from at the time we reached this milestone were Australia, Canada, Turkey,
  the United Kingdom and the United States (NOTE: in alphabetical order)
• Users signing up at this time now
  have an average of 321 friends

Characteristics of users joining the
week Facebook hit 25M users (January 2006)

• The median age of users signing up
  at that time was about 19
• The top five countries where people
  connected from at the time we reached this milestone were Australia,
  Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States (NOTE: in
  alphabetical order)
• Users who signed up at this time now
  have an average of 598 friends

Here is Mark Zuckerberg's official statement:

"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."