HitWise UK reports that Twitter became one of the 100 most visited websites in the UK for the first time last week. It ranked 91st within ‘All Categories’, placing above Expedia UK (96), Gumtree (100), easyJet (101), Digital Spy (103) and Money Supermarket (105). Twitter now ranks as 7th within the HitWise Social Networking and Forums category, up from 23rd just three weeks ago.
HitWise has also confirmed what TechCrunch UK predicted: there was a real increase in visits following the media attention generated by the likes of Stephen Fry (owner of the world’s second favourite Twitter feed after Barack Obama) and Jonathon Ross on the latter’s TV show (see clip below).
Over the last 12 months traffic to Twitter.com has increased 27 fold. However, HitWise does not measure traffic via mobile or the API so the numbers are probably a lot higher.
Twitter’s use on the iPhone must also be exploding in the UK because Twitpic, which allows you to post pictures form the iPhone ranked 7th last week, up from 26th a month ago. UK Internet traffic to the site has increased more than 5 fold already this year.