The number of Syrians who have fled their conflict-hit homeland has topped 850,000.

The number of Syrians who have fled their conflict-hit homeland has topped 850,000, the UN refugee agency said Tuesday.

"As of the 17th of February, we have over 850,000 Syrian refugees who are awaiting registration or have been registered," agency spokesman Babar Baluch told reporters in Geneva.

Only a year ago, the United Nations said 33,000 Syrians had fled the conflict which erupted in March 201.

The United Nations has warned that refugee numbers could reach 1.1 million within months in what has become an increasingly radicalized civil war in the nation of almost 21 million.

Most of the refugees have fled to neighboring Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq.

The United Nations says that some 2.5 million have been displaced by the fighting but remain in Syria.