There's an ongoing argument about whether the Olympic Games or the World Cup is the world's biggest sporting event.

They occur two years apart, so it's not easy to be definitive, but as far as the online world is concerned the World Cup is the event to beat.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Facebook reported that there were more interactions on its system during the first week of the tournament than for any event it had previously measured - more than about the 2014 Winter Olympics, Super Bowl (American football) and Oscars combined.

The company worked with more than 50 broadcasters to deliver live and on-demand video of all 64 matches to more than 80 countries.

The Netherlands-Argentina semi-final match saw a peak traffic rate of 6.9Tbps, the highest for any live sports event delivered by Akamai.

The final between Germany and Argentina came close at 6.6 Tbps.

The Germany-Brazil semi-final on July 8th reached 5.8 Tbps and contributed to Akamai's highest-ever overall total traffic peak of 23Tbps.

Akamai officials said that overall, weekday matches saw higher streaming rates than those at weekends, and the same was true for matches played earlier in the day rather than later.

Image: FIFA World Cup Brazil wallpaper by Zee Que of Design Bolts