--- title: Facebook: You're 3.57 Degrees of Separation From Kevin Bacon description: And everyone else, for that matter canonical: https://time.com/4208157/facebook-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon/ author: NBC News article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-02-04T17:47:45.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:29:43.148Z og:title: Facebook Says You're Only 3.57 Degrees of Separation From Kevin Bacon og:description: And everyone else, for that matter og:url: https://time.com/4208157/facebook-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbaa978b898c4649a/69887c283c163964b545be1e/facebook-degrees-separation-bacon.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5140 og:image:height: 2891 og:image:alt: Facebook og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Facebook Says You're Only 3.57 Degrees of Separation From Kevin Bacon twitter:description: And everyone else, for that matter twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbaa978b898c4649a/69887c283c163964b545be1e/facebook-degrees-separation-bacon.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Facebook Says You're Only 3.57 Degrees of Separation From Kevin Bacon > Sponsored content. 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It curates the day's top headlines with TIME's reporting and analysis across politics, world affairs, business, health and culture. It is free to join at time.com/newsletters. #### How do I sign up for The Brief? The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-brief-2026q3/newsletters?i=76ed19c1-a32b-4038-a873-46e7bd87fb9b&cr=time-nl-brief-2026q3-v1) by [Akane Otani / CNBC, NBC News](https://time.com/author/nbc-news/) ## Akane Otani / CNBC, NBC News Feb 4, 2016 5:47 PM UTC  Company Logo of Facebook on January 18, 2016 in Berlin, Germany. Company Logo of Facebook on January 18, 2016 in Berlin, Germany. Thomas Trutschel—Photothek/Getty Images by [Akane Otani / CNBC, NBC News](https://time.com/author/nbc-news/) ## Akane Otani / CNBC, NBC News Feb 4, 2016 5:47 PM UTC Forget six degrees of separation. [Facebook](http://data.cnbc.com/quotes/FB) says your friends are much closer to you than you thought. The average pair of Facebook users has just 3.57 degrees of separation between them, the social media network said Thursday in a new [study](https://research.facebook.com/blog/three-and-a-half-degrees-of-separation/). In the United States, that number is more like 3.46 degrees. “Over the past five years, the global Facebook community has more than doubled in size,” Facebook said in a statement. “This is a significant reflection of how closely connected the world has become.” The social media network, which counts 1.59 billion users around the world, is celebrating its 12th birthday Thursday. [_Read the story from our partners at NBC News_](http://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/3-57-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon-maybe-facebook-n511131?cid=par-time%5F20160204) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4208157/facebook-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4208157/facebook-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon/"},"headline":"Facebook Says You're Only 3.57 Degrees of Separation From Kevin Bacon","datePublished":"2016-02-04T17:47:45.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:29:43.148Z","description":"And everyone else, for that matter","url":"https://time.com/4208157/facebook-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Social Media","viral","facebook","People"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbaa978b898c4649a/69887c283c163964b545be1e/facebook-degrees-separation-bacon.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Akane Otani / CNBC, NBC News"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbaa978b898c4649a/69887c283c163964b545be1e/facebook-degrees-separation-bacon.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Facebook","caption":"Company Logo of Facebook on January 18, 2016 in Berlin, Germany.","creditText":"Thomas Trutschel—Photothek/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4208157/facebook-degrees-separation-kevin-bacon/","name":"Facebook Says You're Only 3.57 Degrees of Separation From Kevin Bacon"}}]}] ```