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4% of online Americans are using social location services

Stuart Dredge
4% of online Americans are using social location services

Around 8.8 million people checking in from their phones.

4% of online adults in the US are using social location services from their phones, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center.

It says that on any given day, 1% of online adults use services like Foursquare and Gowalla.

This might not sound like many people, and Pew doesn't break down what that 4% means in actual numbers.

However, based on separate estimates that around 220 million Americans are online, it equates to around 8.8 million people using social location services.

Pew's survey was conducted between 9 August and 13 September, but it's unclear whether it asked people about Facebook Places, which launched later in August.

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18-29 year-olds and Hispanic online users both over-index - 8% and 10% respectively use social location services.

The category ignited in March 2009 when Foursquare and Gowalla both launched in the US. As Pew points out, two years after its launch, Twitter only had 6% penetration - the question is whether social location can follow a similar trajectory to that service now.

Tags: foursquare , gowalla , pew