YouTube has announced more than one billion people are now visiting its online video site each month. 
 
 The milestone marks another step in YouTube's evolution from a quirky start-up launched in 2005 to one of the most influential forces in today's media landscape. 
 
 YouTube crossed the one billion threshold five months after Facebook said its online social network had reached that figure. 
 
 The vast audience has given YouTube's owner, Google Inc, another lucrative channel for selling online adverts beyond its dominant internet search engine. 
 
 Google bought YouTube for $1.76bn in 2006 when the video site had an estimated 50 million users worldwide. 

 We all know YouTube is the biggest video sharing site around, but how big is it, exactly, when compared to sites such as Facebook or Twitter? Here's a hint: YouTube has just hit one billion monthly unique users. 
 
 For comparison, Facebook hit that milestone in October 2012. It took the social network eight years to reach one billion active users — almost the exact amount of time as YouTube, which was founded in February 2005. Twitter, which has been around since March 2006, has more than 200 million monthly active users. 
 
 The YouTube team gives us a few more comparisons for good measure: "Nearly one out of every two people on the Internet visits YouTube. Our monthly viewership is the equivalent of roughly ten Super Bowl audiences. If YouTube were a country, we’d be the third largest in the world after China and India," says YouTube on its official blog. 
 
 YouTube also gives a more detailed insight on what's powering this growth in another blog post about Generation C and mobile devices. According to YouTube, Generation C (or Gen C) is a generation that has grown up consuming content "where and when they want". They watch YouTube on all screens; they constantly switch between devices, they're deeply engaged with online video and they thrive on community. Finally, they're curators — they care about finding content that's important to them. 
 
 Gen C, which YouTube considers to be its core audience, now watch just as much YouTube content on smartphones as they do on PCs, and 67% of Gen C watch YouTube on two devices or more, compared to 53% of the general population. 
 
 With the rise of smartphones, which have become the dominant force in the mobile phone industry in the last couple of years and show no signs of slowing down, YouTube needn't worry about maintaining this growth for at least another couple of years. 
 
 Image credit: YouTube 

 Nearly one out of every two people on the Internet visits YouTube. 
 
 Our monthly viewership is the equivalent of roughly ten Super Bowl audiences. 
 
 If YouTube were a country, we’d be the third largest in the world after China and India. 
 
 PSY and Madonna would have to repeat their Madison Square Garden performance in front of a packed house 200,000 more times. That’s a lot of Gangnam Style! 
 
 In the last eight years you’ve come to YouTube to watch, share and fall in love with videos from all over the world. Tens of thousands of partners have created channels that have found and built businesses for passionate, engaged audiences. Advertisers have taken notice: all of the Ad Age Top 100 brands are now running campaigns on YouTube. And today, we’re announcing a new milestone:What does a billion people tuning into YouTube look like?From the aspiring filmmaker in his basement and the next great pop musician, to the fans all around the world who tune in, subscribe and share their favorite videos with the planet, thank you for making YouTube what it is today. You have truly created something special.The YouTube TeamP.S.: To learn more about what’s powering this growth, check out our blog post about Gen C and mobile devices.
– Five months ago, Facebook announced it had reached a billion users per month—now, you can add YouTube to that exclusive club, Mashable reports. The video-sharing site announced the unique-visitors milestone on its blog, which notes that "nearly one out of every two people on the Internet visits YouTube," and "if YouTube were a country, we'd be the third largest in the world after China and India." When Google bought YouTube for $1.76 billion in 2006, it had 50 million users, Sky News notes.