Facebook adds 3.5 million Arabic users

Facebook's decision to add an Arabic interface in March 2009 has opened up access to a whole new demographic of internet users and added 3.5 million Arabic language users over the past year, said a new report from Spot On Public Relations.

Egypt and Saudi Arabia's Facebook communities have seen the strongest growth among Arabic users during the past year with each adding 1.1 million Arabic language interface users.

The report, 'Middle East and Africa Facebook Demographics', confirmed that with this growth the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) region currently has more subscribers to social media service Facebook than there are copies of newspapers. According to the report, Facebook has more than 15 million users in the region, while the total regional Arabic, English and French newspaper circulation stands at just under 14 million copies as tracked by Media Source Middle East.

Carrington Malin, Managing Director of Spot On Public Relations, said: "The growth in Arabic language users has been very strong indeed: some 3.5 million began using Facebook during the past year, since the introduction of Arabic support and we can expect millions more Arabic language users to join the platform."

Five country markets in Mena now account for some 70 per cent of Facebook users; Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia and the UAE with a gender bias towards male users. Only 37 per cent of Facebook users in the Middle East are female compared with 56 per cent in the US and 52 per cent in the UK. Lebanon has the highest female percentage with about 45 per cent.

The report also shows that some 50 per cent of Mena Facebook users select English as their primary language, with 25 per cent selecting French and just 23 per cent Arabic. While English users still top rank in the region, a 98 per cent majority of Mena's French language users are from North Africa. Egypt's 3.5 million Facebook subscribers help to make North Africa the largest Facebook community in Mena, accounting for 7.7 million out of a total of 15 million Mena users, accounting for 44 per cent of users in North Africa. The GCC states account for some five million users.

On the local level, the Egyptian Facebook community comprises 20 per cent of the total online population. Its Facebook community is growing at more than 100 per cent per annum. In Egypt, only 34 per cent of users currently use the Arabic language interface.

The two key markets of Saudi Arabia and the UAE have been quick to embrace Facebook – some 33 per cent of the UAE's population uses Facebook and it also now stands as the country's second most visited website after google.ae, according to websites ranked by Alexa.com with 33 per cent of the UAE residents using Facebook. Interestingly, some 68 per cent of Facebook users in the Emirates are over 25 years old, having the oldest Facebook population in the region. According to the report, 41 per cent of the UAE's Facebook community is above 30.

Jordan, on the other hand, has the largest young community on Facebook with users below 25 years comprising a majority slightly above 70 per cent. Over 48 per cent of Facebook subscribers in Saudi Arabia are under 25 years old, with an equal split between English and Arabic users. However, about three times the number of Arabic users have joined Facebook in Saudi Arabia over the past year, compared with the number of English language users. About 67 per cent of Saudis on Facebook are male.

In general, the young users in the GCC countries form less than 50 per cent of the total Facebook users, with Bahrain showing the highest share with 50 per cent of users below 25 years.

Alexander McNabb, Director, Spot On PR, said: "For users, Facebook is becoming a richer and larger component of their daily lives, but for advertisers and communications professionals it's starting to look like an essential part of the Mena marketing mix. In this region, if you're going to go where your customers are going, then the answer's clearly online."