London, June 14, IRNA , China looks set to overtake the US as the world's largest broadband market this year, according to the latest data of connections from UK-based internet consultants, Point Topic.

New statistics on subscribers in 101 countries shows that the US still leads the pack with just over 60 million broadband users during the first quarter of this year.

But second-place China is rapidly closing the gap with more than 56 m connections, up from 41 m users a year ago as a result of economic growth and greater access.

"What amazed me when compiling these figures is that China has leapt ahead and actually had more people sign up to broadband in the first three months of this year than in any other earlier quarter," said research director at Point Topic, Katja Mueller.

The figures show that almost 300 million people worldwide are now accessing the internet using fast broadband connections out of more more than 1.1 billion of the world's estimated 6.6 bn people that are calculated to be online.

But the latest report also found a widening gap between the high levels of broadband penetration in western Europe, North America and hi-tech economies such as South Korea, compared with developing countries, especially in Africa.

In the top 10, Japan was ranked third, with 26.5 m broadband users, ahead of Germany with over 16 m in fourth place and France in fifth with more than 15 m.

The UK was lagging behind South Korea in sixth place with just under 14 m subscribers at the end of March, and in terms of broadband penetration.

Based on penetration, South Korea is by far the world's top broadband user with nearly 90 per cent of households online. Several small, such as Hong Kong, Monaco and Macau, were also high on the list.

In the US, broadband penetration was under 53 per cent in 24th place, while in China it was only 14.35 per cent. In India, just 1.15 per cent of the country's estimated 200 million households had broadband access.

Penetration was found to be low in Eastern Europe but with strong growth of over 10 per cent, while the highest growth across the world was record in Indonesia albeit from a very low base.

In Africa, many sub-Saharan African states do not register in the figures with only South Africa, Sudan, Senegal and Gabon making it on to the list.