Facebook sets new record: 1 billion people on the site in a single day

Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg announced today that on Monday the company had 1 billion people logged into the site. This is the first time in its history that Facebook has hit this milestone.

In a posting, Zuckerberg shared that while the company uses “average numbers” for its financials, this is actual numbers, which equates to 1 in 7 people on Earth connecting with their friends and family using Facebook.

Although Facebook is proud to have clocked 1 billion people logged into the site on a single day, what investors and analysts are probably looking at are the daily active users (DAUs). During the company’s Q2 FY2015 earnings report, Facebook’s DAUs increased to 968 million, up 17 percent from the year prior.

The fact that so many people logged on in a single day is telling about what people can do on the social network. Where exactly these new users came from remains unknown, but for at least one day, the company has this great milestone to celebrate — and advertisers can, too, knowing that people are still flocking to use the social network.

To mark the occasion, Facebook has put together this video, which it uses to describe exactly what’s behind the number “1 billion”:

In after-hours trading, Facebook’s stock is up 0.76 percent, after closing up 2.91 percent at $89.73.