YouTube has proudly announced it has passed one billion regular users on a monthly basis.

Announcing the milestone on its blog, the video sharing site owned by Google said a recent growth in smartphones had helped boost the numbers visiting the site every month.

YouTube’s popularity provides Google with a lucrative channel through which to sell advertising, alongside its core search business.

YouTube was launched in 2005 and bought by Google in 2006.

Google paid $1.76 billion for YouTube, which at the time had an estimated 30-40 million users worldwide.

With one billion monthly users, it poses a challenge to Facebook as the internet’s largest social network. Facebook reached a billion users in October 2012.

“Nearly one out of every two people on the Internet visits YouTube,” the company said in its statement.

YouTube has proudly announced it has passed one billion regular users on a monthly basis

YouTube was keen to stress the business potential of such a large audience.

“Tens of thousands of partners have created channels that have found and built businesses for passionate, engaged audiences. Advertisers have taken notice,” it said, saying that the top 100 brands listed by trade magazine Advertising Age were now running campaigns on YouTube.

YouTube was launched in California by three former PayPal employees.

The first video uploaded was by co-founder Jawed Karim and titled Me at the Zoo.