The China Internet Network Information Center released a report on Chinese network development on Wednesday. 

The center reported that by the end of June, the number of Chinese internet users had climbed to 710 million, or 21.3 million more than six months ago.

Meanwhile, internet coverage hit 51.7 percent of the population, 1.3 percentage points higher than the end of last year. That was also 3.1 and 8.1 percentage points higher than the global and Asian averages respectively. 

The number of mobile internet users in China climbed to 656 million, or 92.5 percent of all users. At the end of 2015, that number had been 90.1 percent. Among all of the mobile internet  users, 25 percent only use mobile phones to surf the internet. 

Users of online education and car hailing and government services surpassed 100 million people. The growth of online payments and wealth management was 9.3 percent and 12.3 percent from a half year ago.

But the gap in internet coverage between rural and urban areas still remains large. By the end of June, internet coverage in rural areas was 31.7 percent, much lower than the 67.3 percent in urban areas.