The Reston, Virginia based internet researcher comScore, Inc., on Tuesday, released its ranking of the top search properties in Japan based on data from the comScore qSearch service.

The leader in measuring the digital world, comScore in its study found that total 6.8 billion searches were conducted in Japan in January, which were 9-percent up from the searches year ago. The comScore study found that January saw the highest monthly search volume on record.

Maru Sato, managing director of comScore Japan, said, "2008 was another year of very solid growth in the search market in Japan. Home to the third largest Internet population in the world, Japan represents a valuable market for search engines. It is also one of the more competitive search markets, with two large companies, Yahoo! and Google, each controlling a significant share of the market."

The comScore study found that Yahoo! Sites led the search ranking in Japan with 3.5 billion searches in January
2009, up 13 percent from the previous year, followed by Google Sites with 2.6 billion searches (up 5 percent) and Rakuten Inc. with 153 million searches (up 38 percent). It found that the Excite Japan had the strongest growth of any search property in the top ten, growing 362 percent versus year ago to 52 million searches.

The comScore study found that Yahoo! sites attracted more than half of all searches in January, in Japan. Yahoo! Sites captured 51 percent of all search queries, followed by Google Sites with 38 percent and Rakuten Inc. with 2 percent.

According to comScore study, Yahoo! Sites had the highest frequency of searches per searcher at 62, followed by Google Sites at 55 searches per searcher.

The other search properties that got place in comScore's the top ten search properties in Japan include NEC Corporation (24 searches per searcher), Excite Japan (20 searches per searcher), and Nifty Corporation (13 searches per searcher).