China now has more than 800 million telephone subscribers and more than half of them are mobile phones users, according to statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry.

At the end of August, there were more than 804 million telephone subscribers, including 367.9 million for land line phones and 437 million mobile phone subscribers. Statistics show that the number of mobile users jumped by 44.07 million in the first eight months of the year, with an average monthly increase of 5.5 million.

During the same period, the number of text messages sent by mobile phone users rose to 273.67 billion, up 43.6 percent year on year.

Figures show Chinese telephone subscribers exceeded 100 million in 1998, 200 million in 2000, 300 million in 2001, and 700 million in 2005.

(Xinhua News Agency September 21, 2006)