China’s netizen population hits record 904 million: Report

A woman wearing a face mask against coronavirus walks past light decorations at a retail street in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province on April 10, 2020.

The number of Internet connections in China reached a whopping 904 million by March this year, up by 75.08 million from 2018, according to an official report released on Tuesday.

Internet penetration in China has reached 64.5%, up 4.9 percentage points over the end of 2018, the report issued by the China Internet Network Information Centre (CINIC) said.

As Internet connections grew in large numbers facilitating the growth of online social media in the country, China supervises and controls the content through massive firewalls.

While global social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Google are blocked in the country, China also exercises greater supervision over poplar Internet media platforms like Weibo, which is akin to Twitter, to control the content.

The number of netizens accessing the Internet through mobile phones in China has increased by 79.92 million from the end of 2018 to 897 million in March 2020, accounting for 99.3% of the total number, state-run Xinhua quoted the CINIC report as saying.

As of March, the size of Internet users in the country’s rural areas reached 255 million or 28.2% of the total netizen population, up 33.08 million from the end of 2018, while the number of urban netizens has grown by 42 million from the end of 2018 to 649 million, accounting for 71.8% of the total, according to the report.

The proportions of Chinese netizens accessing the internet through desktops, laptops, TVs and tablet stood at 42.7%, 35.1%, 32% and 29% by March respectively, the report added.