Senior police in Perth say the monitoring of social media sites helped them keep control of New Year celebrations around Western Australia.

Police say 220 people were arrested, 70 more than last year, but overall most people were well behaved.

Commander Fred Gere says police closed down several parties advertised on Facebook before they started, including one which had 1,500 hits.

"One of the early interventions was there was a Facebook party down on foreshore on Attadale advertised," he said.

"Again what we did, we actually located the person who advertised it, went around, knocked on the door and lo and behold, the father had no idea what his son was organising.

"All of a sudden the party was cancelled and there was 1,500 people going elsewhere."