DEEP DIVE DATAZimbabwe's most-visited websites, ranked.Betting and adult content beat almost everything local.
This is Part 0 of a research series, triggered by an X exchange.
Someone shared a top-10 websites screenshot from Semrush. We took a deeper dive and found a list of the 10,000 most-visited sites in Zimbabwe by desktop, according to Semrush's metrics — and monitored the traffic over an 8-day period.
Part 1 will dive into the traffic trends of the weekend-to-work-week transition.
Ranks 1–10
| 1. wikipedia.org | Education |
| 2. youtube.com | Entertainment |
| 3. betting.co.zw | Gambling |
| 4. google.com | Search Engine |
| 5. facebook.com | Social Media |
| 6. twitter.com | Social Media |
| 7. instagram.com | Social Media |
| 8. xvideos.com | Adult Content |
| 9. premierleague.com | Sports |
| 10. whatsapp.com | Messaging |
The only local site in the top 10 is a betting platform, sitting at rank 3 — ahead of Google.
Ranks 11–20
| 11. bbc.com | News |
| 12. xnxx.com | Adult Content |
| 13. x.com | Social Media |
| 14. imdb.com | Entertainment |
| 15. merriam-webster.com | Education |
| 16. pornhub.com | Adult Content |
| 17. accuweather.com | Weather |
| 18. weather.com | Weather |
| 19. pinterest.com | Social Media |
| 20. uefa.com | Sports |
Social, adult and entertainment sites dominate
The remaining four spots are one site each: News, Gambling, Search Engine and Messaging — driven by BBC, betting.co.zw, Google and WhatsApp respectively.
The national top 20 barely touches Zimbabwe.
Social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest) is the single most common category, followed closely by adult content (XVideos, Xnxx, Pornhub) and entertainment (YouTube, X.com, IMDB). Only one locally-run site — betting.co.zw — cracks the top 20, and it does so through gambling, not information or services.
Ranks 1–11
| 1. betting.co.zw | Global #3 · Gambling |
| 2. herald.co.zw | Global #27 · News |
| 3. zimsec.co.zw | Global #34 · Education |
| 4. pindula.co.zw | Global #49 · News |
| 5. stanbicbank.co.zw | Global #56 · Finance |
| 6. vacancymail.co.zw | Global #64 · Jobs |
| 7. newsday.co.zw | Global #65 · News |
| 8. chronicle.co.zw | Global #93 · News |
| 9. cbz.co.zw | Global #96 · Finance |
| 10. rbz.co.zw | Global #100 · Finance |
| 11. classifieds.co.zw | Global #102 · Marketplace |
Ranks 12–22
| 12. zetdc.co.zw | Global #109 · Energy |
| 13. zimra.co.zw | Global #113 · Government |
| 14. property.co.zw | Global #116 · Real Estate |
| 15. fbc.co.zw | Global #117 · Finance |
| 16. zimpapers.co.zw | Global #126 · Media |
| 17. myzimbabwe.co.zw | Global #167 · News |
| 18. cabs.co.zw | Global #174 · Finance |
| 19. telone.co.zw | Global #175 · Telecoms |
| 20. nedbank.co.zw | Global #186 · Finance |
| 21. hmetro.co.zw | Global #194 · News |
| 22. thedirectory.co.zw | Global #199 · Directory |
This list runs to 22 sites because two ties in the original ranking pushed the "top 20" out to 22 entries.
- Betting and news dominate. betting.co.zw leads, reflecting strong engagement with online gambling, followed by prominent news sites like herald.co.zw and pindula.co.zw — a public need for timely information.
- Essential services cluster near the top. Financial platforms (stanbicbank.co.zw, cbz.co.zw, rbz.co.zw) and government sites (zimra.co.zw, zetdc.co.zw) are heavily used for banking, taxation and utilities.
- Education and employment needs show up too. zimsec.co.zw (education) and vacancymail.co.zw (job opportunities) underline demand for academic resources and employment tools.
- Diverse marketplaces exist. classifieds.co.zw and property.co.zw serve local buying, selling and real estate needs — a thriving digital marketplace.
Ranks 424–527
| 1. soccer24.co.zw | Global #424 · Sport |
| 2. bancabc.co.zw | Global #427 · Finance |
| 3. zbc.co.zw | Global #433 · News |
| 4. magetsi.co.zw | Global #434 · Utilities |
| 5. kfc.co.zw | Global #436 · Food |
| 6. tmpnponline.co.zw | Global #449 · Retail |
| 7. fusertech.co.zw | Global #465 · Technology |
| 8. mwosfc.co.zw | Global #488 · Sports |
| 9. unionhardware.co.zw | Global #514 · Retail |
| 10. spar.co.zw | Global #527 · Retail |
Ranks 555–599
| 11. zimauto.co.zw | Global #555 · Automotive |
| 12. sundaynews.co.zw | Global #558 · News |
| 13. v.co.zw | Global #561 · Banking |
| 14. delta.co.zw | Global #563 · Beverages |
| 15. nyaradzo.co.zw | Global #568 · Insurance |
| 16. aazimbabwe.co.zw | Global #569 · Automotive |
| 17. kwayedza.co.zw | Global #575 · News |
| 18. cimas.co.zw | Global #580 · Insurance |
| 19. acz.co.zw | Global #584 · Transportation |
| 20. spincity.co.zw | Global #599 · Gambling |
- Retail and food, underperforming. spar.co.zw, unionhardware.co.zw and tmpnponline.co.zw reflect retail and hardware services; kfc.co.zw shows the fast-food sector's weak digital pull.
- News and media, still diverse. zbc.co.zw, sundaynews.co.zw and kwayedza.co.zw underline a range of news offerings, including vernacular content, even at the bottom of the register.
- Finance and insurance, less trafficked. bancabc.co.zw and v.co.zw serve banking; cimas.co.zw and nyaradzo.co.zw provide insurance-related services.
- Sports and betting, mixed. soccer24.co.zw and mwosfc.co.zw cover sports; spincity.co.zw represents online betting — a different fate from betting.co.zw's rank of 3.
- Technology and automotive, niche. fusertech.co.zw serves technology; zimauto.co.zw and aazimbabwe.co.zw serve the automotive sector.
- Utilities and transport, low traffic. magetsi.co.zw offers utility services; acz.co.zw focuses on transportation.
- Other sectors. delta.co.zw reflects the beverage industry, rounding out a long tail of low-traffic sector sites.
Same sectors, wildly different fortunes.
Betting shows up at both ends of the .co.zw spectrum: betting.co.zw sits at global rank 3, while spincity.co.zw sits at rank 599. News, finance and retail sites appear throughout the full range too — suggesting traffic within a sector in Zimbabwe depends heavily on which specific operator built the stronger digital presence, not just what the sector is.
Zimbabwe's internet runs on global platforms first, local utility second
The national top 20 is almost entirely foreign platforms — social media, search, adult content, entertainment — with betting.co.zw as the lone local outlier. The .co.zw web, when you isolate it, is a different story: news, banking, tax, education and jobs lead, exactly the services Zimbabweans need day to day.
This is Part 0 of a series. Part 1 turns to how that traffic shifts between weekends and the work week.
Deep Dive Data covers Zimbabwe capital markets and financial products.