Facebook is so popular in the US that its in-app browser is now the third-largest mobile browser in the country, following Safari and Chrome, according to a study from analytics firm Mixpanel.
It still significantly trails behind Safari and Chrome, but now nearly 8% of all mobile browsing in the US is done through Facebook, the study shows. Every time you click on a link from Facebook in your mobile app, that means you’re using the built-in browser, unless you’ve disabled it.
The top states where people use Facebook as a browser are Washington, Rhode Island, Montana, Indiana and Minnesota. TechCrunch, which first reported the data, points out that this means people may be using Facebook as their main channel of internet use. This is good news for the company, but is perhaps disquieting more broadly, considering how content on Facebook is filtered and tailored to each individual user, and how easily misinformation spreads on the platform, Tech Crunch notes.
In emerging markets, Facebook is often seen as the entirety of the internet, which has exacerbated the platform’s pernicious influence on politics and societal tensions.