Yesterday afternoon Blizzard announced to the world that the virtual world of Azeroth is now inhabited by over 9 million players. In only the past five months, Blizzard has secured over 500,000 new subscribers and an increase in returning users.

Making it's debut in North America on November 23rd, 2004, WoW has since become the most popular MMORPG around the world. Throughout all of 2005 and 2006 the game remained locked into the number one spot of the bestselling PC games charts, and even as we move deep into 2007, Blizzard has managed to remain at or near the top. The Burning Crusade, Blizzard’s recent expansion for its MMORPG, received massively popular reviews and further bolstered the subscriber base, packing in a plethora of new content and new high-end quests for its hungry fanbase.

Within the first 24 hours of the release of the expansion, an incredible 2.4 million copies were bought either online or off of store shelves; where some had lined up for days in order to obtain the highly anticipated sequel. That number culminated in 3.5 million purchases by the end of the first month.

By itself, that figure is stunning. Add on the fact that 9 million is the number of active subscribers and not all-time subscribers and then you’ll see why this is such a big deal. Also keep in mind that the expansion has yet to be released in mainland china, one of the markets where WoW enjoys it's greatest success.

This news comes to us only weeks just over a week before BlizzCon is set to kickoff in Anaheim, California, where GotFrag will be on-site to bring you the latest news and updates from the world’s premier World of Warcraft event.