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Updated on December 10, 2021
The world’s most popular websites online include the usual suspects, such as Google and Facebook. However, they also include Russian and Chinese sites. And yes, pornography is also popular.
The infographic below outlines the world’s most visited sites (as of February 2019) according to the website SimilarWeb.
The Big 5 tech companies
Unsurprisingly, the world’s most popular website is Google. Google.com is the listed page; however, I’m not sure if that listing includes the various country-specific Google sites, such as Google.ca (for Canada). Google also clocks in at #2, for Google-owned YouTube. There’s also the Google-tied AMP Project (for AMP-based mobile-friendly pages) at #14.
Facebook comes in at #3, plus #9 for Facebook-owned Instagram.
Amazon comes in at #14; again, I’m not sure if the country-specific versions of Amazon are included. That said, Amazon’s influence doesn’t seem as dominant outside of North America, judging from Kobo’s prominent non-US ebook prominence, plus popular country-specific retailers. Though oddly, popular Chinese online retailer Alibaba isn’t on this chart.
Microsoft’s Outlook comes in at #15, while Apple doesn’t place at all.
Russian and Chinese sites
Given the two countries’ influence (and for China, its population size), it’s not surprising Russian and Chinese sites would put in appearances on this list.
The fourth-most popular site is Baidu, China’s answer to Google (the latter’s now banned in mainland China). China also clocks in at #18 with QQ, a popular Internet chat service there.
Russia comes in at #10 for Yandex, a Russian internet search engine/tech giant. Russian sites also come in at #16 (Russian social media giant VK) and #19 (a popular email service).
Adult media sites
Finally, pornography also appears in the top 20 sites, though it’s not as dominant as one would expect. Pornhub is the most popular adult media site, but it only clocks in in eighth place. Two others come in at #11 and #12.
Adult media’s popular online, of course. However, my guess why more didn’t appear in this list include the sheer number of such sites, often catering to specific interests or groups (LGBT people, for instance).
Image by Mudassar Iqbal from Pixabay
