How many people use RSS anyway?

October 15, 2007 By

One of the slams I saw yesterday after we started posting Google Reader’s feed numbers is that “nobody reads RSS.”

Today, Erick Schonfeld at TechCrunch, gave us some more numbers so we can extrapolate out just how many people actually are using RSS.

First, let’s start with the BBC. That’s the #1 most subscribed to feed on Google Reader that I can find.

Google Reader is reporting that 1,387,559 are subscribed to the News Front Page and another 824784 are subscribed to the UK Edition.

Let’s just call that two million people. Yeah, I know that many people are probably subscribed to both feeds, but let’s just go with it to make the math simple.

Now let’s make an assumption. Let’s say that half of all Google Readers are subscribed to the BBC. That means about four million people are using Google Reader.

Using the data from TechCrunch we see that Google counts for about 38% of all people using a feed reader. Let’s just round that to 40%. That means about 10 million people use RSS. Or probably less if my assumptions above prove to be too liberal.

So, why so small? And why does the world care about the behaviors of only 10 million people (out of six billion).

A few reasons.

First, getting 10 million users isn’t too shabby.

Second, I never expected RSS to get as popular as Paris Hilton.

Third, what’s the real power of RSS? The news influencers use it. So, if you want to reach the Paris Hilton crowd you’ve probably gotta go through someone who uses an RSS aggregator. Most of the journalists and almost all of the bloggers I know use RSS.

But, anyway, is 10 million a good or bad number? Why?

UPDATE: Alex Barrera says he asked FeedBurner reported to him that they have 65.6 million subscribers.

Filed Under: Firefox, GooglePark, Russia
Newer Comments →
  • Alex Barrera

    Hi Robert,
    Recently I asked the guys at Feedburner for some stats and I was shock to know that they currently have for Q1 2007 58.5MM subscriptions to FeedBurner managed feeds and 65.6MM for Q2 2007.

    I dunno how said that RSS isn’t used but hell yeah it’s used!!

  • Alex Barrera

    how = who (sorry for the typo)

  • Alex Barrera

    Hi Robert,
    Recently I asked the guys at Feedburner for some stats and I was shock to know that they currently have for Q1 2007 58.5MM subscriptions to FeedBurner managed feeds and 65.6MM for Q2 2007.

    I dunno how said that RSS isn’t used but hell yeah it’s used!!

  • Alex Barrera

    how = who (sorry for the typo)

  • http://blog.webreakstuff.com/wp-rss2.php Fred Oliveira

    I’m thinking way more than 10 million people use RSS. I would say its more around the 50 to 70 million – mainly because your BBC figure is way (way!) too high, Robert.

    Anyway, even if it is 10 million, I do agree with your assessment that the new influencers all use RSS and these microchunk ways of communicating (Twitter, Jaiku, Facebook status updates). I guess whatever the number is, it is a good number because the right people use the technology.

  • http://blog.webreakstuff.com/wp-rss2.php Fred Oliveira

    I’m thinking way more than 10 million people use RSS. I would say its more around the 50 to 70 million – mainly because your BBC figure is way (way!) too high, Robert.

    Anyway, even if it is 10 million, I do agree with your assessment that the new influencers all use RSS and these microchunk ways of communicating (Twitter, Jaiku, Facebook status updates). I guess whatever the number is, it is a good number because the right people use the technology.

  • http://www.kknet.fi/ Helge V. Keitel

    Scoblizer, I do agree about feeds. First I thought the feeds are great. I haven’t been to my Google feeds for weeks.

    Nothing bad with the feeds. I might get a slow day and it’s like getting back and reading old newspapers. It’s fun, in summer, I like to read old stuff.

    Feeds are about times gone. History!

    Now I rely on Jaiku and Twitter as my daily inspiration for what to read and what to react to.

    Facebook does a good assembly work. It’s like an old-fashioned factory doing good assembly.

    Microblogs are the contemporary rumour-machines.

    Br
    Helge
    Finland

  • http://www.kknet.fi Helge V. Keitel

    Scoblizer, I do agree about feeds. First I thought the feeds are great. I haven’t been to my Google feeds for weeks.

    Nothing bad with the feeds. I might get a slow day and it’s like getting back and reading old newspapers. It’s fun, in summer, I like to read old stuff.

    Feeds are about times gone. History!

    Now I rely on Jaiku and Twitter as my daily inspiration for what to read and what to react to.

    Facebook does a good assembly work. It’s like an old-fashioned factory doing good assembly.

    Microblogs are the contemporary rumour-machines.

    Br
    Helge
    Finland

  • http://blogstorm.co.uk/ Patrick Altoft

    What about all the people who use RSS but don’t know it? Examples like iGoogle and personalized homepages spring to mind. I think its way more than 10 million.

    Another 600,000 read the BBC using iGoogle so taking your maths you can add at least 30% to 10 million.
    http://www.google.com/ig/directory?url=http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_world_edition/front_page/rss.xml

  • http://blogstorm.co.uk Patrick Altoft

    What about all the people who use RSS but don’t know it? Examples like iGoogle and personalized homepages spring to mind. I think its way more than 10 million.

    Another 600,000 read the BBC using iGoogle so taking your maths you can add at least 30% to 10 million.
    http://www.google.com/ig/directory?url=http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_world_edition/front_page/rss.xml

  • http://iphone-obsessed.blogspot.com/ Orville Chomer

    Using RSS is the *practical* way of doing things, but human behaviour can be far from practical. Consider my own behaviour! In many ways I’m an “early adopter” in the delusions of my own mind (true Chomer for you), but I’m a late adopter in reality. I really started seriously reading blogs a couple years After they really got big. Same thing Writing a blog or two. It doesn’t mean I didn’t Read or Write any blog posts much earlier… but it never amounted to anything. Scrobleizer is now at the top of my favorites list and I check it regularly (I’ve been doing so for about a year now). I read other blogs too but not as religiously.
    Feeling a little stupid for not using an RSS reader (after reading your post), I proceeded to create a link on my home page to my Google Reader. Yes, I had set up my own Google reader somewhere in the distant past… and, like so many other things like this, I bearly used it and forgot about it. I then added Scrobleizer to it. One thing I did notice [Rationalization Coming] [ It was missing all your posts for today... so it looks to be a day behind. Thus it is not as good as going directly to your blog.]
    Ultimately, having an RSS reader is more efficient than bopping around to various blogs. So then, why am I not doing this consistently?
    I’m lazy… :P
    Perhaps I like change on the outside but I don’t like to change my own behaviour. I’m sure there are probably (sad to say) alot of other people like me. I’m going to work on using a reader regularly Robert. Maybe I can learn a new good habit and get more out of the internet!

  • http://iphone-obsessed.blogspot.com/ Orville Chomer

    Using RSS is the *practical* way of doing things, but human behaviour can be far from practical. Consider my own behaviour! In many ways I’m an “early adopter” in the delusions of my own mind (true Chomer for you), but I’m a late adopter in reality. I really started seriously reading blogs a couple years After they really got big. Same thing Writing a blog or two. It doesn’t mean I didn’t Read or Write any blog posts much earlier… but it never amounted to anything. Scrobleizer is now at the top of my favorites list and I check it regularly (I’ve been doing so for about a year now). I read other blogs too but not as religiously.
    Feeling a little stupid for not using an RSS reader (after reading your post), I proceeded to create a link on my home page to my Google Reader. Yes, I had set up my own Google reader somewhere in the distant past… and, like so many other things like this, I bearly used it and forgot about it. I then added Scrobleizer to it. One thing I did notice [Rationalization Coming] [ It was missing all your posts for today... so it looks to be a day behind. Thus it is not as good as going directly to your blog.]
    Ultimately, having an RSS reader is more efficient than bopping around to various blogs. So then, why am I not doing this consistently?
    I’m lazy… :P
    Perhaps I like change on the outside but I don’t like to change my own behaviour. I’m sure there are probably (sad to say) alot of other people like me. I’m going to work on using a reader regularly Robert. Maybe I can learn a new good habit and get more out of the internet!

  • http://www.sciencebase.com sciencebase

    Found a nice vid explain how to subscribe and why you should using RSS.

    http://www.sciencetext.com/click-the-orange-video.html

    db

  • http://www.sciencebase.com David Bradley

    Found a nice vid explain how to subscribe and why you should using RSS.

    http://www.sciencetext.com/click-the-orange-video.html

    db

  • http://dawnkey.wordpress.com/ Dawn D.

    I don’t need RSS. I’d rather just let you do the work, Robert. ;)

  • http://dawnkey.wordpress.com/ Dawn D.

    I don’t need RSS. I’d rather just let you do the work, Robert. ;)

  • http://invincible-windows.blogspot.com/ Eric S.

    If we divide these numbers into the estimated total computers connected to the Internet, which I believe is roughly 700,000,000; we wind up with about 1 in 316. That actually sounds right to me.

  • http://invincible-windows.blogspot.com/ Eric S.

    If we divide these numbers into the estimated total computers connected to the Internet, which I believe is roughly 700,000,000; we wind up with about 1 in 316. That actually sounds right to me.

  • http://www.skykid.wordpress.com/ skykid

    I am using RSS on daily basis – but I guess many people do not know about its advantages. The whole RSS thing seems a bit complicated to my Dad for example . Before getting used to it – it seemed too complicated to me as well. Now that`s changed – but still…

  • http://www.skykid.wordpress.com skykid

    I am using RSS on daily basis – but I guess many people do not know about its advantages. The whole RSS thing seems a bit complicated to my Dad for example . Before getting used to it – it seemed too complicated to me as well. Now that`s changed – but still…

  • http://tenyearsofpics.blogspot.com/ Patrick Dodds

    I’ve let the feeds on my pc lapse a little and haven’t been keeping up with them of late (with some exceptions – here and Boingboing, for example). But on my phone which, though 3G, is still of course incredibly slow, RSS is very useful indeed. And, as more people get used to having / start to want the internet with them wherever they are, and it becomes affordable, then RSS will, IMHO, start to grow.

  • http://tenyearsofpics.blogspot.com Patrick Dodds

    I’ve let the feeds on my pc lapse a little and haven’t been keeping up with them of late (with some exceptions – here and Boingboing, for example). But on my phone which, though 3G, is still of course incredibly slow, RSS is very useful indeed. And, as more people get used to having / start to want the internet with them wherever they are, and it becomes affordable, then RSS will, IMHO, start to grow.

  • http://www.bastiendemange.com/ bastien

    even if it’s 20 or 30 millions, it is not huge !

    But, as you say, rss is used by journalist, blogger, and people who want to have the hotest news. we can say that is the people who make the information. when we see the daily news in the TV, it is probably done with some RSS feeds. so it is important for the information maker, but not for everybody !

    one of the probleme i see with the rss it is not a participative thing, not web 2.0 because, you read, you read a lot of feed, the maximum, to know about everything and you don’t participate to the conversation. besause the feed reader is not done for it !!

  • http://www.bastiendemange.com bastien

    even if it’s 20 or 30 millions, it is not huge !

    But, as you say, rss is used by journalist, blogger, and people who want to have the hotest news. we can say that is the people who make the information. when we see the daily news in the TV, it is probably done with some RSS feeds. so it is important for the information maker, but not for everybody !

    one of the probleme i see with the rss it is not a participative thing, not web 2.0 because, you read, you read a lot of feed, the maximum, to know about everything and you don’t participate to the conversation. besause the feed reader is not done for it !!

  • http://www.socialjump.com/ William

    I don’t doubt your numbers but 10 million seems incredibly small compared to the number of internet users. Could it be that people just don’t realize the convenience of RSS yet?

  • http://www.socialjump.com William

    I don’t doubt your numbers but 10 million seems incredibly small compared to the number of internet users. Could it be that people just don’t realize the convenience of RSS yet?

  • cthrall

    RSS, at the moment, is mostly used for publishing articles. Wait until more people realize you can do things like have a RSS feed for a product search. What if I could watch ebay for an item going for less than some price? And more sites do that…and I can watch them all from Google Reader…

  • cthrall

    RSS, at the moment, is mostly used for publishing articles. Wait until more people realize you can do things like have a RSS feed for a product search. What if I could watch ebay for an item going for less than some price? And more sites do that…and I can watch them all from Google Reader…

  • http://craigrentmeester.typepad.com/ Craig Rentmeester

    I think the number of RSS users is quite higher than 10 million. In fact, I’d say its over 20 million. I completely agree with Robert that the influencers and idea spreaders of the world use RSS.

    The reason that RSS users are an important audience is that they’re more likely to share links amongst each other and to people later in the adoption curve.

    For those not using an RSS reader or using live bookmarks, a great use of them is if you’re looking for a job online. You can set up search criteria through most sites (Monster, Hot Jobs, etc.) and then any job posting that fits the criteria gets routed to you. It saves hours of time sifting through postings in the job search process.

  • http://craigrentmeester.typepad.com Craig Rentmeester

    I think the number of RSS users is quite higher than 10 million. In fact, I’d say its over 20 million. I completely agree with Robert that the influencers and idea spreaders of the world use RSS.

    The reason that RSS users are an important audience is that they’re more likely to share links amongst each other and to people later in the adoption curve.

    For those not using an RSS reader or using live bookmarks, a great use of them is if you’re looking for a job online. You can set up search criteria through most sites (Monster, Hot Jobs, etc.) and then any job posting that fits the criteria gets routed to you. It saves hours of time sifting through postings in the job search process.

  • http://www.techcrunch.com/ Erick Schonfeld

    Robert,

    Thanks for the link, but just to clarify: the 38 percent is not a measure of subscribers. It is a measure of activity. In other words, of all the feeds added to feed readers in September, 38 percent were added to Google Reader. My Yahoo could have more users, they are just not adding as many feeds.

  • http://www.techcrunch.com Erick Schonfeld

    Robert,

    Thanks for the link, but just to clarify: the 38 percent is not a measure of subscribers. It is a measure of activity. In other words, of all the feeds added to feed readers in September, 38 percent were added to Google Reader. My Yahoo could have more users, they are just not adding as many feeds.

  • http://mylesbraithwaite.com/ Myles Braithwaite

    Personally as a developer RSS feeds are so easy to make (just SQL query’ really) that there is no reason for me not to include them on all my sites. Actually everything you can do on the sites I develop with a browser you can also do with rss feeds.

  • http://mylesbraithwaite.com/ Myles Braithwaite

    Personally as a developer RSS feeds are so easy to make (just SQL query’ really) that there is no reason for me not to include them on all my sites. Actually everything you can do on the sites I develop with a browser you can also do with rss feeds.

  • Marika

    I started using feeds a couple of years ago and it really changed my internet habits. Previously I spent a lot of time checking whether sites were updated and looking for new stuff, now I just subscribe to feeds and spend my time productively.

    I think the best way to get people to use feeds is to set them up with an easy to use reader and feeds that really interest them and make things easier for them. I started with Feedreader, which is really simple to use, then moved to RSSBandit for more features and later Google Reader beginning this summer, so I could easily catch up with news after summer weekends away from home.

    In my opinion starting to use feeds was almost as life-changing as getting broadband instead of the old slow and expensive modem.

  • Project

    A lot of people use syndication without really knowing what it is.

    Podcasting.
    Facebook news feed (though not RSS)
    My Yahoo

    I think the word ‘RSS’ is just too abstract on its own. People will use it if its masqueraded into a convenience for them.

  • Project

    A lot of people use syndication without really knowing what it is.

    Podcasting.
    Facebook news feed (though not RSS)
    My Yahoo

    I think the word ‘RSS’ is just too abstract on its own. People will use it if its masqueraded into a convenience for them.

  • Marika

    I started using feeds a couple of years ago and it really changed my internet habits. Previously I spent a lot of time checking whether sites were updated and looking for new stuff, now I just subscribe to feeds and spend my time productively.

    I think the best way to get people to use feeds is to set them up with an easy to use reader and feeds that really interest them and make things easier for them. I started with Feedreader, which is really simple to use, then moved to RSSBandit for more features and later Google Reader beginning this summer, so I could easily catch up with news after summer weekends away from home.

    In my opinion starting to use feeds was almost as life-changing as getting broadband instead of the old slow and expensive modem.

  • http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com/ JT

    Its respectable. But until my mum and my non-geek mates understand what I mean when the words “RSS” pass my lips then its still in early-adopter territory. Everything starts there tho so that’s no bad thing.

    -jamie

  • http://jamiethomson.spaces.live.com JT

    Its respectable. But until my mum and my non-geek mates understand what I mean when the words “RSS” pass my lips then its still in early-adopter territory. Everything starts there tho so that’s no bad thing.

    -jamie

  • http://the.taoofmac.com/ Rui Carmo

    I would say those 10 million need to be fact-checked. Taken as is, they are an infinitesimal figure that might well equal the amount of technical savvy people who “got” RSS from the get go, but it still seems small in an age where new (European) mobile handsets already support feed auto-discovery…

    Maybe it’s the cusp of something. But maybe it’s just another statistic that needs to be substantiated further.

  • http://the.taoofmac.com Rui Carmo

    I would say those 10 million need to be fact-checked. Taken as is, they are an infinitesimal figure that might well equal the amount of technical savvy people who “got” RSS from the get go, but it still seems small in an age where new (European) mobile handsets already support feed auto-discovery…

    Maybe it’s the cusp of something. But maybe it’s just another statistic that needs to be substantiated further.

  • http://www.omg.no/ Ludvik Høegh-Krohn

    Would be intersting to know how many of the subscribers actually reads their feeds also. Personally I don’t know how else I should manage to navigate through “Blogtropolis”

    Btw: just started to read your “your naked conversations”.

  • http://www.omg.no Ludvik Høegh-Krohn

    Would be intersting to know how many of the subscribers actually reads their feeds also. Personally I don’t know how else I should manage to navigate through “Blogtropolis”

    Btw: just started to read your “your naked conversations”.

  • http://brentevans.blogspot.com/ Brent

    10M seems low, but I can’t really say for certain.

    I can say that I subscribe to RSS and I’ve been working on increasing the RSS readership of my blog with some success. Do I get more hits or fewer hits with those people subscribed to RSS? No brainer: More hits by far – I do have a more tech-savvy group, but there are plenty of my readers who are reading the blog for the media tech news such as TV news and tools, photo tools etc. and they ARE using RSS for sure.

  • http://brentevans.blogspot.com Brent

    10M seems low, but I can’t really say for certain.

    I can say that I subscribe to RSS and I’ve been working on increasing the RSS readership of my blog with some success. Do I get more hits or fewer hits with those people subscribed to RSS? No brainer: More hits by far – I do have a more tech-savvy group, but there are plenty of my readers who are reading the blog for the media tech news such as TV news and tools, photo tools etc. and they ARE using RSS for sure.

  • http://beta.zooomr.com/photos/JeffHenderson Jeff Henderson

    I’ve been using Google Reader for about 6 months now. I’m pretty picky about what I subscribe to as I’m trying not to spend my whole life reading posts! I can say that I’m probably monitoring about 5 times as many sites/Blogs as I used to the old fashion way in the same amount of time. The other benefit is that I see new posts and news immediately, without having to go and visit a bunch of web sites several times a day to see what is new. I have Google Reader running in my browser on all of my computers at home and work. At this point there is no going back to the old way of doing things!! I’m totally addicted to RSS and it’s convenience. I do feel a little guilty though as I now hardly ever visit the actual web sites & Blogs I monitor. I know that this mucks up advertising and ranking of some sites. Plus people spend time and money making their sites look good and us RSS viewers hardly ever get to see it.

  • http://beta.zooomr.com/photos/JeffHenderson Jeff Henderson

    I’ve been using Google Reader for about 6 months now. I’m pretty picky about what I subscribe to as I’m trying not to spend my whole life reading posts! I can say that I’m probably monitoring about 5 times as many sites/Blogs as I used to the old fashion way in the same amount of time. The other benefit is that I see new posts and news immediately, without having to go and visit a bunch of web sites several times a day to see what is new. I have Google Reader running in my browser on all of my computers at home and work. At this point there is no going back to the old way of doing things!! I’m totally addicted to RSS and it’s convenience. I do feel a little guilty though as I now hardly ever visit the actual web sites & Blogs I monitor. I know that this mucks up advertising and ranking of some sites. Plus people spend time and money making their sites look good and us RSS viewers hardly ever get to see it.

  • DerFrankie

    I think the best part of RSS is beyond the End-User (the ones that read the content in a reader). It is now so simple to pipeline content from one site to another. I can for example integrate new features to an older CMS without throuwing out everything. It’s so nice to publish content once and let other services (email, sms, …) publish it for you without the need of further interaction.

    IMHO CMS was the first revolution (separating content from form) for websites and RSS is the second (joining data from different sources easily)

  • David Weiner

    Robert,

    While most of the journalists and bloggers in your world are power RSS users, I think that the majority of journalists are not using RSS… Sadly, the overall number is probably less than 30%.

Newer Comments →