Facebook and Orkut are two of the most popular social networking sites, with both offering very similar features and capabilities. Comparing FaceBook vs. Orkut from a market share perspective will show you that both are considerably behind MySpace with Facebook owning just over 11.5% of the market share and Orkut having less than 1%. Facebook has become very popular in North America over the last few months whereas Orkut is extremely popular in India.
I do have access to both an Orkut and Facebook account and find myself using Facebook the majority of the time. I actually prefer Facebook when comparing Facebook vs. Orkut from a usability perspective, here’s why:
– From an overall cosmetic point of view, Facebook is a much more professional looking whereas Orkut looks somewhat unfinished
– Facebook’s Mini Feed feature is useful in seeing a quick snapshot on the latest happenings within your network
– The ease at which you can customize layouts within FaceBook, especially the drag and drop option.
– The ability to supply how you know a person (through school, other friends, work, randomly, etc…). This is especially interesting when you and one your contacts know the same person, but through different ways.
Here’s what I like about Orkut:
– Within Orkut you can view people’s profiles regardless if they are a ‘friend’ or not.
– I like how you can see the number of times your profile has been viewed with Orkut.
– The integration of Google Chat (maybe there is an opportunity for Microsoft to go after Facebook for the same purpose).
Anonymous says
May 30, 2007 at 2:41 amHi Manoj,
” Within Orkut you can view people’s profiles regardless if they are a ‘friend’ or not.”
I don’t like orkut for the very same reason…:-)
Anyone can see my personal and often preferred to be restricted to a select group of frends information. I have seen that many are using orkut to find additional information including photos of brides/grooms in orkut that normally protected in matrimony sites.
Cheers!
Febin says
July 12, 2011 at 9:49 pmHi,
orkut is meant for social networking….not private or hidden networking….so i tink ORKUT rocks as a social networking site…wre as FACEBOOK dnt….i personnaly got no friends tru FB…all the friends i got tru social networking was tru orkut….most of the people import contacts from orkut to FB…..i tink FB is jst a fun site…wreas ORKUT is a social networking site….
Raj says
June 25, 2007 at 5:09 amManoj,
orkut and facebooj are Social netwroking sites means public to all. I tried using facebook, i like the looks of it, cool tools and amazing features but its not one wants to look in a social networking prtal, the ease by which you can work in orkut is really cool and easy but its look quite complicated in facebook, i remember when i start using orkut i never had any issue, but in facebook its seems difficult to start with because of limited access. Well i will give orkut full points here…..and yeah its not compulsary to put a picture in orkut u can always hide it!!!
Andre says
September 25, 2007 at 3:44 amOrkut is much more intuitive.
Facebook is navigation is very confusing.
Anonymous says
October 24, 2007 at 7:18 amI agree with you Manoj. Facebook has a more polished look. On the other hand facebook has a little entry barrier for new folks…
Kag
Anonymous says
October 24, 2007 at 5:20 pmthe good thing about facebook is you can selectively control what people can see on your profile…so more privacy…on the other hand if u want u can allow the world to see whats going on your side of the world too…now facebook might seem to be overly complicated because it allows you to do a lot more suff other than just browsing others profiles and read scraps…finally, point raised before, u can see whats going on with ur friends in the mini thread…which is amazing…u dont have to put comments like..”**UPDATED MAH PICS..CHECK IT OUT**” on ur profile if u r using facebook…its definitely more fun with facebook than orkut…
full points to facebook
Abhishek says
January 3, 2008 at 7:47 amStarted off with Orkut, but tried Facebook too. Facebook has much professional look, but to me, Orkut is the winner for the ease of navigation and the simplicity. There are lot of newer privacy features which are being provided by Orkut these days. So, privacy is not much of a issue with orkut anymore. My full points goes to Orkut… May be simply because I am Indian 😉
Planomania says
February 4, 2008 at 9:18 amwell about FACEBOOK….at first i liked it’s overall look…which seemed polished..
some friends of mine liked it’s privacy…..
but later on i realized it wasn’t an open social site after all….It lacked the open discussions and debates that go on orkut within its forums….somehow i never found myself going onto any of it’s forums….It’s good only for those who want to keep contact with their friends only….not for those who are looking towards discussion forums…and finding people with similar point of views…
facebook has its games and some funny features…but thats it….
It’s reach as a social network is Limited….with no open contact…
Suleman says
February 9, 2008 at 2:36 amHeyY!
I Dont Get It Why People Are Alwayz Looking For Privacy…
If You Are Really Looking For Privacy…Then Just Stay On MSN and Yahoo!…..
Why Do People Try To Hide Their Pix And Other Stuff On Social Networking Sites ….
These Sites Are Meant To Connect People With Each Other…
And If You Are That Concerned About Privacy, There Is No Point In Joining These Social Networking Sites ….
Suleman Imam
Karachi
Anonymous says
April 23, 2008 at 10:13 pm@Suleman…well said dude.
Michel'Angelo Rojas Delgadillo says
May 26, 2008 at 12:20 ami prefeer ICQ instead MSN… and orkut instead facebook… but we (people) obviusly, in communication stuff, prefeer finally, the system that bring you the chance to have “more REAL comunication”, (real in a virtual sense of course)… and that system, is my case, what i prefeer.
so simple :p
rahulrajpl says
June 29, 2008 at 6:38 amHey just saw your review. Nice article. You know that features of orkut is increasing day by day and its been better and better.For me I prefer Orkut though I use both.because when I first entered facebook it was bit confusing to get the things around.Another thing is its very easy to find and add friends in facebook.
Well in a technical point of view these two sites just convey that ASP and PHP are equally powerful web elements which orkut and facebook are using respectively.
somraj says
August 21, 2008 at 1:23 pmwell orkut in my opinion is better and i have my reasons behind it. it has a much user friendly interface and provides features of a perfect social nw site. lots of new features r coming up these days to solve the privacy issue. as one of my friends said abt facebook “It lacked the open discussions and debates that go on orkut within its forums….” thats true ofcourse. suppose u r a person suffering from diabetes or asthma or any sort of physical or mental disease . u don’t know much about it. the orkut forums will provide u with lots of info about it like its nature, doctors available in ur area and so on. sufferers from all round the globe will participate in these forums. thats called helping ppl socially which is not at all available in facebook. suppose u don’t know whether to buy the nokia n96 or the apple iphone. orkut forums will help u to decide about it. so facebook in my opinion is just a hype and not an ideal site meant for social nw. it should be reserved only for the US university students as it was originally meant to be…
seanhecking says
October 1, 2008 at 12:51 pmFacebook’s new format is much better than before. It seems like the buz on Orkut is losing steam. Google needs to get more focused in the social media space and push Orkut. The deal with MySpace will be less attractive a year or two from now as the audience shifts to Facebook.
shobhit "(bhopali) says
October 27, 2008 at 4:19 amorkut is 100000….. times better then facebook
reasons :
1)Within Orkut you can view people’s profiles regardless if they are a ‘friend’ or not….because this feature isnt available on facebook its difficult to find friendz…on orkut you can search for your friendz in secondz
2)facebook is quite complex , where as orkut is very easy
3)privacy is not the issue on ORKUT as most people have said , it is as safe as facebook
4)with its new profile features , orkut looks better ,
5)more options available on orkut
innermission says
November 24, 2008 at 3:31 pmOrkut is a real Social networking site while Facebook is only to hide one’s face under the book in the name of privacy lol
Anonymous says
December 12, 2008 at 2:55 pmI prefer orkut:
– Facebook: it is difficult to search for friends, as you can only see the profile photo before adding as a friend.
– Facebook gives unnecessary updates, which are trivial as to who wrote on whose wall.. which quite frankly, became annoying after a while.
– Facebook interface is not simple to use. as someone said, orkut is very intuitive.
– Facebook: the screen space is not well managed, as there are advertisements, which take up some of the space. I did not find any ads on orkut.
– orkut gives you much easier personalization.. where you can choose whether (and which friends) you want to see updates on and birthday reminders.
– as noted earlier by others, privacy is no more an issue on orkut.
– personally, being an indian, I found many many more friends on orkut than on facebook.
Anonymous says
February 13, 2009 at 11:08 amwhoa! completely agree to this aforesaid argument.
I am an ORKUT user. simple yet loaded. There’s nothing more polished about facebook,it’s just that people are more used to seeing orkut since a long time,so they find nothing exciting.
Facebook:shows your presence to friends of friends unnecessarily and vice versa. What if you are content with your number of friends already.
Facebook:shows comments to everyone linked,whether there’s a need or not.
Facebook:puts distracting,wasteful ads on your space ,orkut: you have your personal space.
no themes on facebook
Usman Shahzada says
March 2, 2009 at 2:23 amOrkut is copying facebook, what i have observed, orkut copied the following features from facebook
updates
status message
Comments on pictures
applications
etc
Anonymous says
March 9, 2009 at 6:21 amWhat all are saying is…facebook is complicated for fresh users…
I do not agree..if you are smart enough to use internet and thn i dont see a point.
looks of facebook is very complete and the new feature orkut introduced (opensocial against FBML) totally a failure as no body is giving any attention to opensocial. google is careless about its products (except google search). I vote for facebook as orkut is an orphan..
ayush says
April 15, 2009 at 2:10 pmpersonally what i think is there is hardly a need to compare the two..i think both have their +ve n -ve side..i like both n i njoy orkutting n facebooking both..thats it
Roy says
May 27, 2009 at 3:28 amWell…
i dont just dont understand y are people not evaluating stuffs in a correct manner…Is it only privacy which matters to u…
Or is it that u are afraid of getting in touch with new people…Wake Up Folks!!!
Its been N number of time i wanted to add someone as a friend of mine on facebook but i could do so because i was unsure of he/she being my frnd…
there shud always be some access to the other peoples profile to call it a social networking site…i dont think facebook is a networking site at all…i would rather catogories it a mixer of yahoo messenger, yahoo games, and some kiddish site …REASON it doesnt provides u exposure…Think on it FOLKS!!!
Dont u thnk Facebook is a site which will make u wait long to open as compared to Orkut…Orkut is Quick to open and fast to use!!! which is the need of today…
Facebook is in no sense user-friend-ly…userfriendly is somethng which can be understood very quicky…
Orkut on the other hand is so very simple and userfriendly…every thng is so very systematically placed which can be caught by the eyes very quicky…
Facebook on the other hand is a puzzle book…not a joke folks!!!
I would always recommend Orkut As compared to facebook…
Orkut Rocks!!!
Pratik Singhania
India.
Lalit says
June 5, 2009 at 10:26 amI generally browse my Orkut and Facebook account through my cellphone. I find Orkut more comfortable than latter. Even though Facebook has a good finish but Orkut maintained it's simplicity. But many features of Orkut which are available in PC version is not yet available in Mobile version.
Pete says
June 6, 2009 at 12:00 amFacebook took over orkut and facebook cannot be stopped its like a search engine google in its space… but google can beat it if they come up with a strategy integrating their whole google aps suite and other things in a smart way so that people wont leave the page at any time see below link reasons why orkut failed
http://www.ceveni.com/2009/06/facebook-win-over-orkut-in-social.html
Max says
June 13, 2009 at 3:22 amI like facebook more than orkut cuz it has a lot of facilities.
As already said you could handle it easily if u r well versed with the internet.Orkut isn't even near facebook's performance and efficiency…
Karthik says
July 1, 2009 at 8:25 amorkut is a lot simpler than facebook.
facebook is just more flashier…which though makes it more attractive but reduces the ease to operate.
n fr privacy…u can get that in orkut too, but then who wants it??
kiran says
July 21, 2009 at 10:18 amwhy do indians try to speak,act,comment,emmote etc like the americans on FB; have they lost all their originality and become slave to american way of life ?
Anonymous says
July 30, 2009 at 11:34 amHi, well there in no point of comparisiom ,the rating of a site may depend on the country itself
,orkut has much more strong network in indian subcontinent and brazil ,so naturally irrespective of what ever features FB etc have to offer orkut is better in these
regions the sme goes for face book in america….as far as i think americans go for latest and trendy things as u see by stats ,so if a new site comes with a bit more features they will move to it…
so in short the efficiany of social networking site depend more on network than on features
YPI Prem says
August 13, 2009 at 3:39 amInteresting enough, your poll shows otherwise. Orkut has more votes than facebook (this is despite the fact that i voted facebook!!)
Rollando Diego Francis says
August 30, 2009 at 10:48 pmorkut is the best it is e sier to use.facebook is soooo stupid i had a head ache the first day i used
Karl says
September 8, 2009 at 5:04 amFacebook Vs. Orkut..muhahaha!
Well, I was an Orkut Addict…but lost the sheen as orkut doesn't exactly give you what you want or like open discussions on facebook(The Comment on the posts feature is the most attractive thing that facebook offers)
I was confused with facebook earlier and moreover with the presnce of fewer friends on Facebook made me get stuck to orkut..but as days passed..friends joined in…got 100's of friends..now each and every post we make…there are more than 50 comments..which I call open discussion..whereas in Orkut you've got to get stuck to your pretty lil scrapbooks and that's it…just chat and discuss…and a few games available on FB too.
If you think Facebook is complicated…YO'..you're correct..but not everything complex is complex forever…now I know what's where and what's what on facebook after using all these years!
Facebook rules Social Networking no matter what ….(Myspace still has to get Indian's on it..else it's a laggard)
chaitu says
September 18, 2009 at 2:10 amorkut is better for social networking but where facebook has advantage of its applications which orkut lacks, for making friends and discussing topics orkut is the best
Anonymous says
October 6, 2009 at 4:18 amFacebook or Orkut or MySpace. All are dumb.
Social Networking is an addict and practically it serves no one other than to kill time.
So, stop wasting time in these networks and do something useful for your country.
dsi says
October 7, 2009 at 10:58 pmThanx for the valuable information. I love orkut. But my friends are spending more time on face book. So Iv got no choice but to move.
THAMPI says
October 21, 2009 at 4:38 amorkut is better!!!
i used both for near 2 years..
definitely orkut is far better than facebook,
i dont agree to the fact that orkut isnt safe, u can hide your photos and details from even your friends in orkut
and 1 more thing
i deactivated my facebook account because its just BULLSHIT
Anonymous says
January 2, 2010 at 10:23 amOrkut simply has got everything what you can expect from the so called social networking sites.Let me ask a question to all Indians who favour Facebook- Why do you all show your madness for facebook when most of the Indians are in Orkut? Just because the Americans are using it? Or to get along with the new trend of 'facebooking'? Long before it gained all these fame, I had heard about this facebook and just to check it out, I created an account. Gosh! It's something like getting lost in some woods. Whereas Orkut is so easy to handle, a cool way to keep in touch with friends. Facebook still has got nothing special/more than Orkut in it. The truth is, as it became a hit in the U.S, everyone moved on to facebook. I've used both and I know the difference for which I consider Orkut is something special. In reality,
so does everyone who at least once in their lifetime have used both Orkut n facebook.
In your own language,it's:
Orkut rocks and facebook sucks!
Noufal says
January 7, 2010 at 1:34 amHi All,
Social networking site means you should be in a position to find everyone. That will enable you to find out your missing friends..
In that case..I give full marks to ORKUT..
Facebook is a professional version of social networking and thus it lose its core meaning…
So I LOVE ORKUT…
Anonymous says
August 20, 2010 at 3:45 pmHello;
I've used both,and all i can say is that it is much friendly environment and easier to express/ present yourself at facebook…..its more humane kindoff…
adios
Marcus Jones says
December 15, 2010 at 2:44 pmwell….. i think facebook is better. I think orkut is…ok… but facebook is an overall better social networking site. orkut is ok but i think Facebook and orkut have two different goals. Facebooks goal is to help you keep in touch with your friends, an Orkut is to help you make new ones. And to those who thought facebook was confusing… maybe you didint give it enough time. im only 14 but made a facebook when i was 12, in under 10 minutes. I want to know how ppl think its confusing…. its really siple pretty much all the stuff you need is on 1 page.
deepak30 says
January 1, 2011 at 10:28 pmfacebook rocks..and i m an indian and i hate orkut..orkut sucks…facebook is coo,SIMPLE,easy to use and has xcellent games ..thumbs up to mark..bye bye 2 orkut..facebook is here!
Ajax says
May 4, 2011 at 12:51 amfew features of facebook i.e. news feed, Group, Pages and multiple comment on pix/albums..
as well as for the people who want to chat as well on social network..the facebook chat window is also there…
if we start a discussion to get the better one..we will find out the -ives of orkut like Childish appearance, Scrapbook is the Only place to comment on a profile..,
Obviously Chat, security, communities are the point which makes Orkut quite preferred… BUT the same is available in fb via Chat window, Security settings, Group ass well..
So we should give it a try.. for d ppl who r saying tht fb is difficult to use..they must spend some time on it..
and i disagree ..with the opinion of fb is for US ..and we India shd use Orkut…
after using both …MY VOTE IS FOR facebook 🙂