When Facebook launched places in mid-August, many predicted that foursquare would not be able to compete against Facebook’s huge user numbers. It’s clear that the introduction of Facebook Places has not had a negative effect on foursquare’s user growth. This morning they processed their 4 millionth user registration.* This comes just over a week since they registered their 200 millionth checkin.

It’s been only 48 days since foursquare hit the 3 million mark on August 29. Before that it was 2 million on July 10 and 1 million on April 22. By any standard, it’s a very impressive growth rate.

Foursquare’s user numbers have no doubt been helped by recent mentions in mainstream media, such as MTV’s VMA Awards, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon and PEOPLE Magazine. Major national retailers like Lowe’s and Walgreens have also included foursquare recently in publications and signage. Another factor helping to increase awareness of foursquare are the users representing foursquare in cities around the world and on college campuses, where they help to encourage users and businesses to sign up.

User growth doesn’t show any signs of slowing down for foursquare, so look for them to hit five million users in late November or early December. What do you think is contributing to foursquare’s rapid growth compared to the competition?

*As judged by user IDs. Since foursquare typically doesn’t announce when they hit these milestones, user ID numbers offer a close approximation for judging user growth. Some users have deleted their accounts, so foursquare will actually hit 4 million users sometime in the next few days.

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