Active Home Internet Users by Country, June 2009

Following growth almost across the board in May, the overall population of active Internet users in the 10 countries tracked by Nielsen Online slowed somewhat during the month of June.

The U.S., however, experienced a substantial spike in active users — up by over 10 percent month-over-month from May to June, to a figure in excess of 172 million.

Markets in Europe witnessed the most significant user declines. Switzerland experienced the greatest reduction, dropping by 3.3 percent month-on-month. Users in France also reduced by 0.41 percent, but this follows a month of strong growth in May during which users grew by 5.57 percent over the previous month. Spain also experienced a reduction of 0.51 percent. Other European territories did experience strong growth, however, with the U.K., Germany, and Italy achieving growth of 3.13 percent, 1.06 percent, and 1.8 percent, respectively.

Elsewhere, active users in Australia grew by 2.47 percent, and those in Brazil remained fairly static with marginal growth of 0.13 percent. Nielsen Online uses a sampling methodology applied worldwide, which allows for data aggregation on a regional and global basis. Active Internet users are derived from the number of users who have logged on in the previous 30 days.