Facebook Accounted For 9 Percent Of US Internet Visits In April, Hitwise Says

With Facebook’s gazillion-dollar* IPO inching closer, Experian Hitwise has shared a number of statistics that provide something of a snapshot about the site and its audience.

One of the numbers that stands out is that nine percent of all U.S. internet visits last month were to Facebook. Hitwise says Facebook is averaging more than 229 million visits per day — that’s about 1.6 billion visits per week — so far in 2012.

And it’s an extremely loyal audience: 96 percent of Facebook’s visitors in April were returning to the site — i.e., they had also visited the site at least once in the previous 30 days.

You want page views? Hitwise says Facebook has delivered more than 400 billion page views (U.S. only) so far in 2012, and the site accounts for about one of every five internet page views in the U.S.

When Facebook goes public on Friday, the IPO is expected to be priced between $34 and $38 per share. This week, it appears to be those financial numbers that matter the most.

* a slight exaggeration on my part