Twitter approaching 500 million registered users, says report

Twitter will surpass the milestone of 500 million registered users today (February 22), according to a report.

Independent analyst Twopcharts claims that the microblogging website is in touching distance of the landmark subscriber figure, but did not predict how many of those accounts are active.

Twitter has yet to comment on the third-party figures, and has not announced any user milestones since it revealed that the website passed 100 million active subscribers in September last year.

The analyst acknowledged that its estimates may be inaccurate as they are based on limited data and some interpretations.

Earlier this month, a research team at Chicago University's Booth Business School found that Twitter is more addictive than alcohol and cigarettes among 18 to 85-year-olds.

Facebook is the world's largest social networking website with more than 800 million active accounts. Google+ has attracted 90 million users since its launch last year.

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