Facebook now has 2 billion users, hitting the number less than five years after reaching the 1 billion mark. But the high point of this phenomenal growth is that Asian and African users were responsible for the boost which has seen Facebook at the top of the league of social media platforms, besting Youtube, WhatsApp, Instagram, WeChat etc.

“We’re making progress connecting the world, and now let’s bring the world closer together,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post.

On average, each day more than 175 million people share a ‘love’ reaction and over 800 million people ‘like’ something on Facebook, and every month more than 1 billion people use Groups, Mike Nowak, product director and Guillermo Spiller, product manager, wrote in a separate post.

They added that Facebook will be sharing several personalised experiences over the coming days to show appreciation for the many ways people support one another on Facebook.

“We are excited to continue to build products that allow people to connect with one another, regardless of where they live or what language they speak.”

YouTube is the only other social media platform that comes close to the 2 billion figure, with 1.5 billion users. The only other platforms that have 1 billion users are Facebook’s own properties (WhatsApp and Messenger) while Instagram is getting there, with 700 million users currently.

In comparison, WeChat has around 889 million users and Twitter has 328 million.

According to TechCrunch, the developing world has played a big role in Facebook’s growth, as the social media giant launched a ‘lite’ version of its app that works on low-bandwidth connections.

Facebook added 746 million users in Asia and the ‘rest of world’ region in the past five years but only 41 million in the US and Canada.

The report added that Facebook’s current user growth is at 17 per cent, which is as fast or faster than any year since 2012, while 66 per cent of its monthly users return each day now compared to 55 per cent give years ago.