comScore has released its latest report on social media across Asia-Pacific (excluding China).

The report found that Australia ranks a nail-biting second to the Philippines for social media penetration. In the Philippines 90% of the web population visited a social networking site during February, the figure for Australia was 89.6% and 88.6% for third place, Indonesia.

Engagement across the region followed a similar pattern, with the average Philippines user spending 5.5 hours monthly on social networking sites, Indonesians 5.4 hours, and Australians and Malaysians 3.8 hours.

Averages for the measured period across Asia-Pacific indicate 2.5 hours are spent per month on social media and an individual will visit the category 15 times monthly. 50.8% of the total online population in the region visited a social networking site during the period. Facebook was the most popular, with a total of 240.3 million visitors.

“While social networking continues to be one of the most popular and fastest growing web activities in the world, its dynamics in the Asia-Pacific region exhibit significantly more individual market differentiation than in other global regions,” said Will Hodgman, comScore executive vice president for Asia Pacific. “In some markets, such as the Philippines, Australia and Indonesia, social networking is one of the most popular web activities reaching nearly 90 percent of the entire Internet population, while other markets report less PC-based social networking penetration, which can often be attributed to the high propensity to engage in social networking via mobile devices in these markets.”