Firefox 3.5 the World’s Favourite Browser?
As the battle for control of the browser market continues, Mozilla Firefox appears to be edging ahead of Microsoft Internet Explorer, according to new findings which come as the result of research compiled by statistics company StatCounter.
StatCounter’s CEO Aodhan Cullen said ‘Firefox 3.5 is now the most popular browser worldwide‘
The research by the company showed that between December 14th-20th, 21.39% of web visitors used Firefox version 3.5, compared to 21.2% who preferred Internet Explorer version 7, a significant finding given that this was the first time that the user base of Firefox 3.5 had surpassed that of Internet Explorer.
However, Firefox only came out ahead in comparison to specific versions of other browsers, as during the same period of time the research showed that in total 55.44% of users still had some version of Internet Explorer as their browser of choice, while 33.12% ran a version of Firefox.
While Cullen noted that all versions of Firefox in use did not numerically equate to all versions of Internet Explorer in use, he explained that this made the statistic no less meaningless as it showed Firefox’s increase in the market share which correlated directly with the decrease in usage of Internet Explorer.
According to Cullen, Firefox‚Äôs continuing rise is all the more remarkable given that it requires installation on the part of the user, while Interent Explorer is pre-installed on new computers running Microsoft Windows, commenting that ‘the market has spoken’
Since January, Internet Explorer has lost more than 17% of its user base, while in contrast Firefox has made a 25% gain.
Furthermore, it now appears that more surfers are adopting Firefox’s latest version (3.5) in comparison to those choosing Internet Explorer’s latest offering (8). In the week of November 9th both browsers held around a 19.5% share in the market. Since this point, Firefox 3.5′s usage rate has increased by 12%, while usage of Internet Explorer 8 has advanced by only 3% in comparison.
The race will continue to intensify in the coming months as Microsoft’s release of Windows 7 is expected to boost the adoption of Internet Explorer 8 by surfers. However Cullen also noted that, thanks to an EU directive, other browsers would also feel the benefit as Microsoft are now required to include other browser options on the OS.
January 31st, 2010 at 11:49 pm
I think that Firefox will be the dominate browser eventually, but I’m really more concerned with just getting rid of IE6. Some people upgrade their car more often than their browser.