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From these names, the only one that people would read and link with the internet/web would be Internet Explorer.

especially if they have been living on the moon for the last five years.

Or the Netherlands.

You just need to search a bit: http://onestat.com/html/aboutus_pressbox57-firefox-mozilla-ie-browser-market-share.html

There's a difference between the two because Google, as popular as it is, has just under half of the search engine market (comScore, Nielsen NetRatings) while Microsoft pretty much dominates the entire OS market with "a global usage share of 96.97 percent"(http://www.onestat.com/html/aboutus_press box46-operating-systems-market-share.html). The other difference is that Windows is sold (and so one could argue that choices such as the browser or media player used should be given to person using the OS) while Google is pretty much a free service that sustains itself almost entirely through it's advertising. Let's put it this way. General Electric owns NBC. NBC makes its money through ads. If GE decides its dishwashers get better ad placement and cheaper rates, who's to say otherwise? If people don't like it, they can flip to another channel. The only one losing money is GE and Google, since they could've sold that spot to an outside competitor.

The statistics this article references are from Net Applications. OneStat also came out with a report recently, and theirs actually shows IE usage up slightly to 85.85%.

So it depends on who you believe...

0.36% of computers that linux runs on Slackware has?

Follow the trail of links!

Here's OneStat's press release, which cites these worldwide stats:

1. Microsoft IE 83.05%
2. Mozilla Firefox 12.93%
3. Apple Safari 1.84%
4. Opera 1.00%
5. Netscape 0.16%

Country-by country stats are at the link. Among the countries surveyed, Opera is most popular in Australia (4.69%) and Safari is most popular in the USA (3.28%).

It's not clear whether they lump Konqueror in with Safari or "other," which doesn't appear on the list.

From the article:

It's to be expected that a coding or Linux forum would have a higher number of users using FireFox than a more general website such as BBC (which requires WMP to play media) or myspace.

Not so, the BBC offers vid/audio content in either Real format or offers a choice between Real and WMP.

Link to the One Stat statistics mentioned.

Well, this is one firm's results and we all know how sometimes findings can be biased. If you want the full report from onestat, it is here with all browsers covered.

Interestingly, Adtech found similar results (~12% in Europe) while The Counter put Firefox at more around ~9-10% for those months. Net Applications placed Firefox at around 10% also. Of course, Wikipiedia has a decent article on this with combined data at the bottom.

I guess 13% seems like kind of a stretch and 10% seems a bit more realistic. I don't know what makes any one source more reliable than the other though as none of them really talk about their strategy for attaining these statistics.

The big question shouldn't be "where is Firefox's percentage" but instead "how do we make Firefox more appealing to non-technical users?" Because it's clear that the technically savvy people have adopted Firefox but you'll never make it past 15% of the population with that attitude. I hate to say it, but introducing some functionality that Internet Explorer doesn't have might be the only way to accomplish that. And when you do that, you lose the stability and security that made it so popular in the first place. Solution? Perhaps a MySpace plug-in in light of recent news? :)

The company I used to work for, a top 10 Dutch e-commerce business, used Onestat. The marketing managers went crazy over it. They liked it a lot.

On the downside: it was expensive and sometimes the backend was very slow.

On the upside: it was possible to measure the visitors on a very low as wel all high level.

A 'blunder' that still holds 85% market share? Yeah, right. Not to mention IIS, Frontpage, and all the other business it drove MS's way.

Sure, welding IE to the OS caused them antitrust trouble and neverending security problems. But, IE has to go on the books as a net gain for M$. Consider what the last 11 years would have looked like for them without it.

Web statistics (and I use that word loosely) that companies like OneStat sell are highly dubious, for all kinds of different reasons. I'd explain exactly what they do wrong, but their technical specs are a bit lacking, wouldn't you say? If you don't believe they are full of it, try reading this:

The OneStat.com solutions provide executives, marketers and webmasters with answers to critical e-business questions such as:

• Who is visiting my website?

Yeah, really convincing and doesn't sound like snake-oil peddlers at all.

Do you really think that isn't misleading? That it doesn't make the average person think that there are 100 million users?

To track visitors you have to implement a small piece of javascript in your HTML pages. This browser-based tagging method is proven to be the most reliable and effective way of tracking your visitors. Measurements are based on IP number, cookie and browser string.

Each day thousands of new IP addresses are added to OneStat's growing database which is based on 2,3 million IP ranges. Nowhere else you can achieve such an accurate picture of where your business visitors are coming from.

1. Google 56.9%
2. Yahoo 21.2%
3. MSN Search 8.9%
4. AOL Search 3.2%

"OneStat.com ( www.onestat.com ), the number one provider of real-time web analytics, today reported that Mozilla's browsers have a total global usage share of 11,51 percent. The total usage share of Mozilla increased 2.82 percent since April 2005...

The global usage share of Mozilla's browsers is still growing and it seems that Netscape users and some Internet Explorer users are switching to the Firefox version."

I'm interested in what data they have for Germany or other countries. If Apache is any example, then Firefox should be much more in use some places: Apache has only about 70% of the HTTP server market worldwide, but has over 90% in Germany.

Do we have to go through this every time? These figures might not be reliable, but that is not the reason. It's easy to spot Opera even when it's spoofing:

Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 98) Opera 7.0 [en]

The press release is at http://www.onestat.com/html/aboutus_pressbox40_bro wser_market_firefox_growing.html, Opera is at 0.77%. In April it was 1.03%

Download Mozilla Firefox!

Mozilla's browsers global usage share is still growing according to OneStat.com

Amsterdam - November 2 2005 - OneStat.com (www.onestat.com), the number one provider of real-time web analytics, today reported that Mozilla's browsers have a total global usage share of 11.51 percent. The total usage share of Mozilla increased 2.82 percent since April 2005. Microsoft's Internet Explorer still dominates the global browser market with a global usage share of 85.45 percent which is 1.18 percent less as at the end of April.

"The global usage share of Mozilla's browsers is still growing and it seems that Netscape users and some Internet Explorer users are switching to the Firefox version. It also looks like that browser users of Internet Explorer for Apple's Mac are switching to Safari because the global usage share is still growing. It is also interesting to see that Microsoft's Internet Explorer has less global usage share in the USA as in the UK. Mozilla's browsers are more popular in USA and Canada as in the UK" said Niels Brinkman, co-founder of OneStat.com.

The most popular browsers on the web are:

1. Microsoft IE = 85.45 %
2. Mozilla Firefox = 11.51 %
3. Apple Safari = 1.75 %
4. Netscape = 0.26 %
5. Opera = 0.77 %

Source: http://www.onestat.com/html/aboutus_pressbox40_bro wser_market_firefox_growing.html

Nearly 17% of Canada, over 14% of the USA and just under 5% of the UK use Firefox!!

Download Mozilla Firefox!

Mozilla's browsers global usage share is still growing according to OneStat.com

Amsterdam - November 2 2005 - OneStat.com (www.onestat.com), the number one provider of real-time web analytics, today reported that Mozilla's browsers have a total global usage share of 11.51 percent. The total usage share of Mozilla increased 2.82 percent since April 2005. Microsoft's Internet Explorer still dominates the global browser market with a global usage share of 85.45 percent which is 1.18 percent less as at the end of April.

"The global usage share of Mozilla's browsers is still growing and it seems that Netscape users and some Internet Explorer users are switching to the Firefox version. It also looks like that browser users of Internet Explorer for Apple's Mac are switching to Safari because the global usage share is still growing. It is also interesting to see that Microsoft's Internet Explorer has less global usage share in the USA as in the UK. Mozilla's browsers are more popular in USA and Canada as in the UK" said Niels Brinkman, co-founder of OneStat.com.

The most popular browsers on the web are:

1. Microsoft IE = 85.45 %
2. Mozilla Firefox = 11.51 %
3. Apple Safari = 1.75 %
4. Netscape = 0.26 %
5. Opera = 0.77 %

Source: http://www.onestat.com/html/aboutus_pressbox40_bro wser_market_firefox_growing.html

Nearly 17% of Canada, over 14% of the USA and just under 5% of the UK use Firefox!!

Didn't they change their metrics a couple months ago to favor IE?

"Finite number of Microsoft haters" translates to "people who have used something else and/or read any web standards.

When OneStat agrees with this drivel, I might buy it.

TheCounter shows just 2% usage share for Mac OS. Combined with the 1-2% usage share for Safari reported by OneStat and 1-2% "other" browser usage reported by WebSideStory, it's hard to believe Mac OS has 16% of the installed base of desktops. Maybe the vast majority of Mac users don't use pre-installed Safari, or haven't upgraded to Mac OS X yet, or just don't browse the web nearly as much as other OS users?

Early on, MS preferred WebSideStory's numbers to OneStat because OneStat showed more of a decline for IE. Personally, I think OneStat has more accurate global numbers. This is a trend that MS can't ignore, and can't really do much about.

This is what OneStat has to say.

Opera is a popular browser???

http://www.onestat.com/html/aboutus_pressbox36.htm l/

Browser Usage...

1. Microsoft IE 87.28 %
2. Mozilla Firefox 8.45 %
3. Apple Safari 1.21 %
4. Netscape 1.11 %
5. Opera 1.09 %

Just because YOU use it, doesn't make it "popular".

Accroding to the Cambridge Dictionaries Online, a monopoly is "(an organization or group which has) complete control of something, especially an area of business, so that others have no share." According to OneStat, Google has a 57.2% share of the search engine market, and Yahoo! has 21.3%. How is Google a monopoly again?

Well, that's 2% among web developers. Opera has closer to a 1% share among the general population.

It is one of the most serious contenders for browsers on embedded devices. It also doesn't have an insignificant market share--it is probably higher than Safari, not to mention Konqueror & other popular open source browser. It is also higher than legacy browsers & one reason probably is that, though it will chew up all the RAM you let it, it also has incredible performance on dated hardware.

"Less than 2 years ago, IE had a 95% lock on the market. Anyone else see a trend here?"

Okay, I realize it's considered Geek Chic to rip the methodology (or, more usually, the lack thereof) used by the "reporters" of these stories. But c'mon! My daughter, who's in 9th grade and not a particular fan of math, could see the holes in this one.

The link used in the sentence quoted above, showing 95% market share for IE, goes to onestat.com. If the reporter had taken the time to check their latest report, IE still has a 93.9% share of the market. It's right there in their press releases! How hard would it have been to look?

I love Firefox, and would love to see IE go away. But I'm getting real tired of having to apply my own personal lameness filter when it comes to determining what Slashdot stories actually have "stuff that matters".

• Browser news puts Gecko-based browsers around 5% for most sources as of 4 Sep.
• The latest publicly-available stats from OneStat indicate just under 3%, but that was back in May.
• WebSideStory/StatMarket's latest numbers are still the ones used in a July C|Net article putting Moz at 4.5%

Most people who visit w3schools.com are not the average user, they are developers: early adopters. It would take at least another 9 months for global Mozilla usage to reach half these levels.

I prefer to go by the stats published by OneStat.com in their Pressbox.

However, I do think the rest of the year will bring a significant change in browser usage.

Most people who visit w3schools.com are not the average user, they are developers: early adopters. It would take at least another 9 months for global Mozilla usage to reach half these levels.

I prefer to go by the stats published by OneStat.com in their Pressbox.

However, I do think the rest of the year will bring a significant change in browser usage.

OneStat and TheCounter are two stats sources you can use. However, they track only browsers that hit sites with their counters on them. These tends to be smaller, less professional sites. In particular, if you check out the last 30 referring URLs to TheCounter you'll find that their service seems to be heavily used by gay porn sites. An unbiased sample, this is not!

OneStat has shown a 1% drop in IE usage in each of their last two reports, the most recent of which was issued on May 28, well before the lastest crop of reasons not to use IE (usage then: 93.9%).

With the recent Moz/FF download increases and FF1.0 in September/October, it would not surprise me if IE usage dropped to or below 90%, with Gecko usage sitting at about 5-6%, before the end of the year.

OneStat has shown a 1% drop in IE usage in each of their last two reports, the most recent of which was issued on May 28, well before the lastest crop of reasons not to use IE (usage then: 93.9%).

With the recent Moz/FF download increases and FF1.0 in September/October, it would not surprise me if IE usage dropped to or below 90%, with Gecko usage sitting at about 5-6%, before the end of the year.

Yeah, your reality != others reality (Moz = 10.1%). Stats can be changed to benefit anyone.

Mozilla people sure have a weird way of defining success. Here's some Reality

...but it's one of the great examples of how it's MS playing catchup, and not everyone else.

Dont get me wrong, I am a big fan of Mozilla and use it for daily browsing. But I have to disagree with your statement. M$ is not playing catch up, its playing dont care. Especially since it still has an overwhelming lead over all the other browsers out there. I refuse to believe that M$ could not have come up with a new version of IE with all the features that Mozilla has (many of which Opera had earlier..) It does not make economic sense for M$ to waste development resources on developing enhancements for IE when they have the market licked.

Given that there were over 605 million connected internet users (in September 2002), that's over 400 million users of your software, and probably more now that it's almost a year and a half later.

Your users span hundreds of thousands of different hardware and software environments. And that doesn't even include IE 5.5 and 5 that they need to patch as well.

They'd better be sure the patch doesn't break anything critical. I'm surprised they don't break things more often than they do.

I seem to remember in the mid 1990's people said the same thing about Internet Explorer. Why after all would people use Internet Explorer when everyone is already using Netscape? By the time Microsoft released IE 4.0 Netscape was struggling... And by IE 5, Netscape's market share was practically non-existant. IE now controls an estimated 95.4% of the web browser market share. The majority of the people still using Netscape are large companies and educational instititutions who tell their employees to use it. However I'm not saying that Internet Explorer is any good. (I'm typing this comment from Mozilla on a windows system.) I'm just saying that it's foolish to think that Flash is safe. Netscape thought they were safe until it was too late. As long as Macromedia reallizes that Sparkle is a potentially major threat, and takes actions to prevent it from becoming so, Macromedia will end up just like Netscape. Of course, unless Microsoft gets with the program and starts integrating tabbed browsing I'd say Mozilla may be able to sneak up on them.

True, but unfortunately, when Windows has 97% os market share, it's a computer virus.

* I'm aware that this statistic can't be accurate, due to user agent spoofing done at both the browser and proxy server level for a variety of reasons including the fact that some web sites still refuse to allow user agents that don't look like IE. Also, this press release was from 9 months ago. Still, it's a significant number of people.

Also, isn't Netscape 6 and 7 basically Mozilla? If so, wouldn't it be safe to attribute the big drop in Netscape users to the possibility that some (most?) of them might have upgraded to either version 6 or 7 of Netscape?

With around 95% of the market it makes sense that Microsoft hasn't really been adding new features to Internet Explorer.

But I'd guess that with the growing dissatisfaction with pop-up advertising and the growing popularity of Mozilla's (or Firebird pop-up blocking they might have to rethink this soon.

A GUI in the Linux kernel tree? That would be like..windows

We could only hope...

Face it - the desktop needs to get rid of all that cruft and get some standards before it can become mainstream. Although it is a nice thing to have, this variety hinders standards, therby keeping both users and developers away.

Found these stats, that say that as of December 16 2002, Mozilla has 1.1% market share.

"The week before that some black guy complained because I wouldnt serve him - it's my right isnt it?"

I knew someone would bring that up. The difference between this and what browser you use is that your skin color or physical ability usually isn't your choice. Most people don't wake up one day and say "I think I will be disabled today" or "I think I will be a minority race today". You pretty much are or you aren't, and you can't usually change it easily.

The browser you use, on the other hand, is entirely your choice. You do have the ability to use Internet Explorer. (And none of this "I use Linux so I can't use IE" stuff... you chose to use Linux as well.) For the most part, when you switch to a different browser, you are aware that some sites will not work well with that browser.

I code my pages to the XHTML standard. I refuse to support Netscape 4.x because it does not support standards. My pages don't work on Mozilla 1.0 because of a bug in Mozilla 1.0's XHTML rendering. Does that mean I should break my layout because Mozilla 1.0 has a bug, considering Mozilla 1.0 is less than one percent of my readership?

The latest browser stats show that Netscape 4 has 1.2% of the market and that Mozilla 1.x has 0.8% of the market. This means that web developers need to spend more time working with the 94.9% of the population that uses Internet Explorer than the decided minority that uses another browser.

Let's face it -- all browsers have quirks. "Coding to standards" will not always solve the problem (as I mentioned above.) Thus, most web developers code for the 95% of their audience that is on IE first, and then choose to make sites compatible with minority browsers at their discretion. If you spend 50% of your development time working around bugs in Netscape 4.x (which has more market share than either Mozilla 1.x or Opera), is that an effective use of your time? If you "code to standards" and your site still doesn't work in Mozilla or Opera, is troubleshooting the problem an effective use of your time considering that those two browsers count for less than 2% of your audience? Like it or not, the answer is most often "No."

Here's the one from OneStat, and of course, check out the Google Zeitgeist. I'd be interested in any statistics to the contrary.