From Google to Generative AI: ranking top Internet services in 2023

The Biggest Internet Services of 2023: What the DNS Data Shows

Every internet user has their own favorites when it comes to news, messaging, video, and shopping. Aggregate those choices across millions of people globally, and you get a clear picture of which online properties dominated attention in 2023. Using anonymized DNS query data from the 1.1.1.1 public resolver, we ranked the top internet services of the year, breaking them down into nine categories — including a new one for 2023: Generative AI.

Our methodology aggregates domains that belong to a single service (so Twitter/X includes twitter.com, t.co, and x.com) and filters out infrastructure domains like root-servers.net. Rankings reflect relative popularity, not absolute traffic: a service can drop in rank even if its own numbers grew, simply because others grew faster.

• Overall winner: Google held the #1 spot all year, with Facebook consistently at #2.
• Fast risers: OpenAI and e-commerce platform Temu both saw explosive growth.
• Category additions: Generative AI joined our tracked categories for the first time.
• News-driven spikes: Events like the banking crisis, Titan submersible story, and the October 7 attack on Israel moved traffic in real time.

The Perennial Leaders: Google, Facebook, and the Rest of the Top 10

The overall ranking remained stable at the top. Google (which we count alongside related services like Google Maps) never faced a serious challenge for #1. Facebook held #2, and Apple generally sat at #3, though TikTok briefly overtook it in April. Microsoft and YouTube traded the #5 and #6 positions.

AWS held a firm #7, kept separate from Amazon by using domains like amazonaws.com. Instagram was a steady #8, with occasional competition from Amazon. The #10 slot saw the most churn, alternating between iCloud, Netflix (mainly on weekends), and Microsoft Office. Notably, X/Twitter reached as high as #10 in 2022 but never cracked the top spot tier in 2023 — a trend we examine further below.

Top 10 — Most popular Internet services 2023, Overall:

1. Google
2. Facebook
3. Apple
4. TikTok
5. Microsoft
6. YouTube
7. AWS
8. Instagram
9. Amazon
10. iCloud

The Generative AI Shake-Up

OpenAI, riding the wave of ChatGPT's late-2022 launch, dominated the Generative AI category from day one. It started the year near #200 in our overall ranking and climbed steadily, peaking at #104 on November 9 — just after its first developer conference. Even the brief removal of Sam Altman in late November didn't dent its traffic.

The rest of the field shifted throughout the year. character.ai, which rose from the top 500 to around #200 overall, took the #2 category spot mid-year from QuillBot. Quora's Poe AI entered the top 10 in late March and settled at #4. Hugging Face was a fixture at #5, while Google's Bard climbed that high in November after expanding to Europe and Brazil.

Anthropic's Claude, whose Claude 2 model launched in July, hit #5 in August but fell to #6 a month later. Midjourney, which relies on Discord commands, peaked at #3 in late March but dropped steadily, landing at #10 by September. Several tools that were popular early — ProWritingAid, Voicemod, Wordtune — faded as the year went on, while Perplexity AI entered the mix at #8 after September.

Top 10 — Generative AI services 2023:

1. OpenAI
2. character.ai
3. QuillBot
4. Hugging Face
5. Poe
6. Perplexity
7. Wordtune
8. Bard
9. ProWritingAid
10. Voicemod

Stable Favorites and Surprise Growth in E-commerce, Social, and Beyond

Temu was the year's retail surprise, surpassing Shein and other established players to reach #7 in the e-commerce category. Black Friday proved to be the biggest day not just for many e-commerce sites but also for payment services like PayPal, Stripe, and Klarna.

In social media, X/Twitter lost some ground overall but remained a significant discussion platform. Instagram's Threads, which arrived in July, is still finding its footing. We also saw news events drive measurable traffic shifts: the March US banking crisis, the Titan submersible implosion, the Wagner Group rebellion, and the October 7 Hamas attack all left visible marks on site traffic patterns.

Finally, two cultural icons showed up in our overall rankings in their own right: Taylor Swift's and Beyoncé's websites both made the list, tracking with their respective tours and releases. For deeper historical trends, the full dataset is available on our Cloudflare Radar Year in Review microsite, which includes additional metrics beyond the service rankings.

Social media: the Facebook effect

Kepios estimates there were 4.95 billion social media users in 2023, about 61.4% of the world population. Those users keep the biggest platforms near the top of our overall rankings, with Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram all featured in our Top 10 Overall Internet services.

Top 10 social media services, 2023

1. Facebook
2. TikTok
3. Instagram
4. X/Twitter
5. Snapchat
6. LinkedIn
7. Discord
8. Reddit
9. Pinterest
10. Kwai

The top five was unchanged year over year. One notable shift: X/Twitter, rebranded in July, never seriously challenged Instagram in 2023, a reversal from 2022 when the two frequently swapped positions. LinkedIn locked in #6, with Discord threatening it on a few days in January and April. Reddit, usually at #8, competed with Discord for #7 over February and March before settling back in April amid its API changes controversy. Reddit tended to win during the week, while Discord pulled ahead on weekends. Pinterest (#9) and Brazilian-market favorite Kwai (#10) rounded out the list.

X/Twitter's football bump

Overall rankings show a wider gap between Instagram and X/Twitter. Instagram parked itself at #8 or #9 for most of the year, briefly touching #10 in May. X/Twitter started 2023 between #12 and #16 after ending 2022 at #12, weaker than the year prior, and drifted to between #13 and #19 by the end of the year.

The notable exception was a weekend bump from April 15 to June 10, when X/Twitter climbed to #11 or #12. Those dates bracket decisive moments in European football: Manchester City's title push in the English Premier League and, later, the Champions League final on June 10. After City's victory — which completed a historic treble — X/Twitter's ranking never reached those heights again.

Social alternatives and other trends

Among the Twitter alternatives, established Tumblr trended downward between #125 and #153 overall. A cluster of Mastodon servers ranked between #160 and #200. Threads first appeared at #227 on July 6, recovered to around #300 by late August, and never cracked the social media top 10 — for context, #10 Kwai typically sits in the overall top 50.

Bluesky entered our Top 500 in late August, spiked to #432 on September 19, and reached #397 on November 19. Truth Social peaked at #318 on August 23 before drifting to around #450 in November. Hive Social, Counter Social, Post.News, T2/Pebble, Parler, and others never appeared in our overall 500.

Other social platforms had distinct patterns throughout the year:

• Snapchat was more of a weekend service, moving between #18 and #21 and trending up after October, with several days at #18, near X/Twitter.
• Discord also peaked on weekends, oscillating between #24 and #35 with an April high at #24. Its trajectory resembled that of Midjourney, the AI image service that runs on Discord, ending the year around #32.
• Reddit, busier on weekdays, dipped over northern summer against the general social trend, ranging from #30 to #38.
• Quora, also a weekday-heavy service, ranged from #116 to #146, falling in summer and settling near #130 in November.
• Tinder slipped from a peak of #124 to #133 in November, with noticeable Sunday surges.
• OnlyFans showed steady growth — peaking at #148 in early July and landing around #175 — with more weekend, and especially Sunday, popularity.

E-commerce: Temu's fast rise

Amazon stayed comfortably on top of our e-commerce category, with Taobao in a firm second. eBay held #2 for much of 2022 but dropped to #3 in 2023, though it reclaimed the spot for stretches in early January and on June 19.

Top 10 e-commerce services, 2023

1. Amazon
2. Taobao
3. eBay
4. Shopify
5. Alibaba
6. AliExpress
7. Temu
8. Rakuten
9. Mercado Libre
10. Walmart

Shopify, a constant #4, overtook eBay on Black Friday. Alibaba peaked on Singles' Day, November 11, while AliExpress held #6. The biggest story was the battle for #7 between Rakuten and Temu. Temu — the Boston-based, Chinese-owned marketplace launched in the US in September 2022 — expanded to Canada, Australia, and New Zealand in February, and edged out Rakuten for #7 overall. It even hit #12 around Black Friday, after not cracking the top 10 at all the year prior. Mercado Libre, Walmart, and Shein spent the year fighting for the bottom two spots.

In the overall ranking:

• Amazon closed the year at #9, improving to #8 during its July Prime Day and Black Friday.
• Shein continued its 2022 growth pattern, rising from ~#130 in January to ~#120 by year-end.
• Temu was outside the top 200 in January but finished the year in the top 100, peaking at #84 on Black Friday — mirroring OpenAI's growth curve — and overtook Shein in May.

• Best Buy, Nike, Adidas, Victoria's Secret, and H&M all peaked on Black Friday; Zara's best day was November 23.
• Target hit #134 on November 12 and #135 on Black Friday itself.
• Ikea, which did not shine during Black Friday week, matched its 2023 peak of #172 on June 14-15, coinciding with its summer sale and a remote-design AI strategy announcement.
• Alibaba topped out at #67 on Singles' Day.

Video streaming: YouTube and Netflix stay uncontested

YouTube remains the dominant video streaming property, with Netflix close behind, and the clearer leader among paid subscription services by a wide margin.

Top 10 video streaming services, 2023

1. YouTube
2. Netflix
3. Twitch
4. Roku
5. Disney Plus
6. Prime Video
7. Hulu
8. HBO/Max
9. Vimeo
10. Pluto TV

Twitch repeated its #3 finish, with Roku at #4. Disney Plus, Prime Video, Hulu, and HBO/Max followed in order, while Vimeo leapfrogged Pluto TV in the later months. Dailymotion briefly appeared in the top 10 for a few days in late February.

Disney Plus periodically challenged Roku, notably on weekends following the August 23 premiere of Ahsoka. Key findings from the overall rankings:

• Netflix reached #9 on Sundays in April and May around the release of The Diplomat, which was the platform's most-watched show at the time. Netflix, Prime Video, and HBO/Max all skewed toward weekend viewing.
• Prime Video peaked early at #50 on March 26, the weekend Top Gun: Maverick premiered.
• HBO/Max trended down from September onward but stayed in the overall top 100.
• Peacock peaked at #111 in October, with Sunday bumps.
• Paramount Plus slid to ~#156 by November, also with a Sunday bump.

News: Globo edges out the BBC, CNN spikes on Titan coverage

News organizations worldwide are central to keeping the public informed, and our 2023 ranking reflects how major events shaped traffic patterns. The Brazilian media conglomerate Globo held the #1 spot for most of the year, a change from 2022 when it was tied with the BBC. The BBC claimed the top position only on June 20, just after the Titan submersible implosion on June 18, which dominated global headlines for the following week.

1. Globo
2. BBC
3. Fox News
4. CNN
5. NY Times
6. Daily Mail
7. Washington Post
8. The Guardian
9. NPR
10. Wall Street Journal

CNN overtook Fox News for the #3 spot from July onward, though Fox regained the lead in November. The New York Times remained steady at #5, followed by the Daily Mail. The Washington Post moved past NPR in June, while the lower half of the top 10 fluctuated more: the Wall Street Journal mostly held #9, briefly reaching #8 in September, and The Guardian hit #8 in October at the start of the Hamas-Israel conflict on October 7.

The year’s biggest news-driven traffic spikes in our Overall ranking included:

• CNN peaked at #73 on June 22, the day the US Coast Guard confirmed debris from the Titan submersible had been found. Its other high point was February 14.

• The Daily Mail (#127) and The Indian Express (#389) also peaked on June 22, with Fox News reaching one of its highest ranks that day as well.
• German outlets Bild and Der Spiegel saw their peaks on June 22 and June 21, respectively.
• BBC jumped to #76 in the Overall ranking on October 8, following the Hamas attack on Israel.
• RT declined overall in 2023 but peaked at #234 on June 24 during the Wagner Group rebellion in Russia.

• Israeli outlets Times of Israel and Haaretz entered the Overall ranking on October 7, peaking at #275 on October 9 and #393 on October 8, respectively.
• The Washington Post peaked at #117 on April 4-5, coinciding with Finland joining NATO and Donald Trump’s not-guilty plea after his indictment.
• China Daily peaked at #361 on January 20, ahead of Chinese New Year on January 22; the South China Morning Post showed a similar rise.
• TMZ reached its highest rank, #243, on October 29 following the death of TV star Matthew Perry.
• BuzzFeed (including buzzfeednews.com) declined over the year, falling to about #300 in November; BuzzFeed News shut down in May after the April announcement.

Messaging: WhatsApp on top, Telegram leaps during Wagner mutiny

Messaging apps remain a core part of social media. Apple’s iMessage is excluded from this ranking because it lacks a unique domain for traffic analysis. WhatsApp held the #1 position for 2023, repeating its 2022 result.

1. WhatsApp
2. QQ
3. Viber
4. Telegram
5. LINE
6. Signal
7. WeChat
8. Messenger
9. GroupMe
10. Kik

The top three are unchanged from 2022: Chinese service QQ (Tencent QQ) at #2, and Viber, popular in Eastern Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, at #3. Telegram, widely used in Eastern Europe and Asia, holds #4, briefly contested by Japan’s LINE early in the year. Signal follows at #5, with WeChat ahead of Facebook’s Messenger. Microsoft’s GroupMe and Canada’s Kik Messenger round out the list. Telegram, WeChat, and Signal all improved their standings versus 2022.

• WhatsApp was most popular from late May to early September, with its peak at #13 overall on November 14.
• Telegram jumped to #79 overall on June 24, driven by the Wagner Group rebellion in Russia on June 23-24.
• WeChat spiked on January 21-22 for Chinese New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. Its 2023 peak of #122 came on August 19, the same day as news of China’s military drills around Taiwan.

Metaverse & Gaming: Roblox dominates, Oculus climbs after Quest 3 launch

We continue to group metaverse and gaming services in one category. Roblox was the clear winner, followed by Microsoft’s Xbox and Sony’s PlayStation — both now platforms for online gaming as much as consoles.

1. Roblox
2. Xbox/Xbox Live
3. Epic Games/Fortnite
4. PlayStation
5. Oculus
6. Steam
7. Electronic Arts
8. Blizzard
9. Nintendo
10. Riot Games/League of Legends

Xbox and PlayStation occupied the podium for most of the year. PlayStation dropped from #3 in 2022 to #4, overtaken by Epic Games (Fortnite) in the latter part of 2023. Oculus — Meta’s VR and metaverse service, including domains from Reality Labs — continued rising from late 2022 to hit #5. It reached as high as #2 on June 29 and again on October 3-4 following the Quest 3 announcement at Meta Connect 2023.

Steam was more popular than Oculus from July through September, holding #5. Electronic Arts stayed solidly at #7, and Blizzard (an Activision Blizzard subsidiary known for World of Warcraft) held #8. Nintendo and Riot Games/League of Legends competed for #9 and #10, with Riot ahead of Nintendo since September.

Financial services: Stripe dethrones PayPal; banking crisis, Black Friday drive spikes

The financial services category spans everything from banking to crypto and tax platforms. Irish-American payment platform Stripe took the #1 spot from PayPal in 2023.

1. Stripe
2. PayPal
3. Alipay
4. TradingView
5. Nubank (BR)
6. Intuit
7. American Express
8. Binance
9. Bradesco Bank
10. CoinGecko

PayPal led early in the year but was overtaken by Stripe on most days from March onward, although PayPal still led on some summer weekends and on Black Friday. TradingView slipped from #3 to #4 when Alipay passed it in late July. Intuit was strongest earlier in the year, peaking on April 18, US Tax Day, but settled mostly at #5 on weekdays.

Brazilian neobank Nubank, the largest such bank in Latin America, was a surprise at #6, rising higher on weekends — it peaked on June 3 and July 1. Binance lost ground through 2023, particularly after August, ending the year between #8 and #9 — a reversal from its 2022 growth trajectory when it ranked #6. CoinGecko, a crypto data aggregator, appeared late in the year with several days at #6 in November, and Coinbase entered at #10 after late October.

Other notable financial services trends in the Overall ranking:

• Investing.com peaked at #199 on March 13, three days after the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and the same day bank shares plunged on contagion fears during the 2023 US banking crisis. MarketWatch also peaked that day at #293.

• Online-only services PayPal (#71) and Klarna (#211) hit their annual peaks on Black Friday, November 24. Stripe spiked to #77 that day, but its best day was November 10 at #68.
• Venmo, PayPal’s mobile payment service, had its strongest month in September.

Binance Slips as Data Services Gain Ground in Crypto Rankings

The crypto sector showed notable moves in 2023 even after FTX’s bankruptcy removed it from the rankings. Binance, Coinbase, and CoinGecko continued to lead the category, but the order shifted over the course of the year.

Top 10 — Cryptocurrency services 2023

1. Binance
2. CoinGecko
3. Coinbase
4. CoinMarketCap
5. NiceHash
6. OKX
7. MEXC
8. CryptoCompare
9. Kraken
10. Crypto.com

CoinGecko, a crypto data provider, built momentum throughout the year and overtook both Binance and Coinbase in November. CoinMarketCap also climbed to #4 by October. CryptoCompare, Kraken, and Trust: Crypto & Bitcoin entered the top 10 for the first time in 2023, while Kucoin and Etherscan dropped out after appearing in 2022.

Binance held the #1 position for most of the year but fell to #2 in November across both the Financial Services and Cryptocurrency categories. The exchange saw several top executives depart in July, and in November US authorities filed a lawsuit resulting in multiple charges and fines. In the overall ranking, Binance peaked at #122 on April 19, the day after US Tax Day, before slipping to around #140 by November.

Notable Movements in the Overall Ranking

Several individual sites saw distinctive traffic patterns outside the main categories:

• Taylor Swift — her official site entered the top 500 on August 10 at #464 when she announced 1989 (Taylor's Version) in Los Angeles and on social media.

Surprise!! 1989 (Taylor’s Version) is on its way to you 🔜! The 1989 album changed my life in countless ways, and it fills me with such excitement to announce that my version of it will be out October 27th. To be perfectly honest, this is my most FAVORITE re-record I’ve ever done…

— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) August 10, 2023

• Beyoncé — her official site first appeared in the ranking on June 15 and reached #346. That same week, the Financial Times reported that Danske Bank economists attributed a surge in Swedish hotel prices and inflation to Beyoncé starting her world tour in Stockholm. June 15 also coincided with a concert in Cologne, Germany, where a fan gender reveal made news.
• GitHub — already a top 50 site, GitHub improved from #49 to #42 by November. It peaked at #36 on January 19 when the company announced it had reached 100 million developers, and hit another high of #38 on May 12.

• Spotify — the service showed strong growth through November, reaching its best day of 2023 on Black Friday (November 24) at #57. The ranking period ended November 25, before Spotify Wrapped launched.
• NASA — traffic peaked at #160 on October 12, the day before the scheduled launch of the Psyche mission to explore a metal-rich asteroid. A second peak at #172 came on April 28 during a broadcast spacewalk at the International Space Station.
• SpaceX — its only notable days in the overall top 500 were April 17 (#412) and April 20 (#416), around the first attempt and subsequent launch of the Starship orbital flight test.
• Craigslist — the classified ads site declined through the year, hitting its lowest point in November and its worst day on Black Friday at #268.
• DHL — improved its ranking in 2023, with its best performance in November and a peak of #211 on Thanksgiving Day (November 23).
• NFL — the league's site saw its first major peak at #189 on April 29, the day of the NFL Draft, which drew more traffic than the Super Bowl. Weekend peaks after September 10 reached as high as #160.
• Flightradar24 — its most-trafficked day was April 23, when an American Airlines flight made an emergency landing in Ohio after an engine fire; the site rose to #176.
• Waze — rankings dipped between June and early September, with peaks on March 19 at #142 and October 2 at #145.
• Tides & Currents — the US Weather Service site peaked at #215 on August 29-30 during Hurricane Idalia as the storm approached Florida's Gulf Coast.

Shifting Tides in AI and E-Commerce

The 2023 rankings show established players like Google and Facebook retaining their dominance while TikTok and others remain highly relevant. The rapid ascent of generative AI services, led by OpenAI's ChatGPT, signals a sector gaining serious momentum heading into 2024.

In social media, X/Twitter appears to be losing some ground in the rankings but remains far ahead of direct competitors. Mastodon, Threads, and other challengers still have significant ground to cover, while Discord and Reddit continued to grow despite not being direct microblogging competitors.

In e-commerce, Temu made notable strides. The crypto space saw Binance lose momentum as CoinGecko gained ground. In gaming and metaverse, Roblox stayed consistent while Oculus showed growth.