Webtoons or webcomics have become mainstream among readers of comics, data showed Monday.

According to data analysis firm Daumsoft Inc., the word “webtoon” has become more frequently used on blog and Twitter posts since 2010. 

The company analyzed over 706,000 blog posts and 3.2 million Twitter comments regarding webtoons.

The analysis showed that webtoons became the third-most popular way people accessed comics in 2015. By comparison, webtoons were ranked seventh between 2010 and 2011, and sixth in 2012, and fifth for 2013 and 2014.

By day of the week, Saturdays saw the most number of webtoon-related tweets, followed by Fridays and Sundays. Webtoon enthusiasts were the least vocal about the topic via Twitter on Mondays.

The analysis also showed that the highest number of webtoon-related posts were created at 11 p.m., when those carried by the portal Naver are updated.

The blog and Twitter posts also showed that more people are growing eager to catch the webtoons as soon as they are updated.

According to the company, total of 493 comments said that the commenters wanted to catch the webtoons in real time, while the figure in 2010 was 48.

As for the device people use to read webtoons, smartphones overtook computers in 2014.

By Choi He-suk (cheesuk@heraldcorp.com)