Pinterest now has more than 150 million monthly active users, up from 100 million a year ago, with more than half outside the US.

The majority of new users (75 per cent) now come from outside its home market.

Pinterest also said that 40 per cent of new users are men.

The firm has made a concerted effort to attract more male users, after finding it was predominantly popular among women. However, data from comScore showed that women are still more loyal users longer than men.

Ben Silbermann, CEO and co-founder said the app is “more of a personal tool than a social one”.

“As a Pinner once said to me, ‘Pinterest is for yourself, not your selfies’ — I love that. Pinterest is more of a personal tool than a social one. People don’t come to see what their friends are doing. (There are lots of other great places out there for that.) Instead, they come to Pinterest to find ideas to try, figure out which ones they love, and learn a little bit about themselves in the process,” he said in a blog post.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the firm, launched in 2010, was valued by investors at $11 billion last year and expects to triple last year’s revenue to $300 million in 2016. It has raised roughly $1.3 billion, including $533 million last year.

Earlier this month, the tech company got its first CFO in a move that was seen by some as a sign for an IPO, but Silbermann denied this, stating the hire only shows “we’re scaling the business up.”

TechCrunch reported Pinterest had expected to make $169 million in revenue by the end of 2015, and cross the 150 million users mark, but it was unable to do both.

Still, it is growing faster and is bigger in the US than Twitter.

In August, the app maker launched its promoted video product for businesses, coupled with featured pins below the video, citing the fact that 75 per cent of the content viewed by users on Pinterest comes from businesses.

The firm has also been on a spree of acquisitions this year. In August it bought Instapaper, the company behind an app that lets users bookmark articles. Before that it acquihired the team behind Tote, an app used to discover and shop, shortly after a similar move involving smart keyboard app Fleksy.