Over half of US online adults use Wikipedia: survey

More than 50 percent of US adult Internet users look up information on Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia which marks its 10th anniversary on Saturday, according to a new report.

A Pew Internet and American Life Project survey found that as of May 2010, 53 percent of adult online Americans consult the user-generated site, up from 36 percent in February 2007.

Younger Internet users were more likely to use Wikipedia.

Sixty-two percent of Internet users under the age of 30 use the service compared with 33 percent of Internet users aged 65 and older, Pew said.

Fifty-two percent of online adults between the ages of 30 and 49 use Wikipedia and 49 percent of those aged 50 to 64.

Wikipedia use was highest among Internet users with a college degree, Pew said, with 69 percent saying they use the site compared with 41 percent of online adults with only a high school diploma.

Pew said using Wikipedia is more popular than sending instant messages, an activity 47 percent of Internet users engage in, but less popular than using social network sites, something 61 percent of adult Internet users do.

The Pew survey of 2,252 adults was conducted in April and May of last year and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.7 percentage points.

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales launched the site on January 15, 2001.