Internet Explorer Slips below 40% Market Share in 2011
IE has ended another year with a huge slide in market share. Google's Chrome posted record growth.
According to StatCounter, IE had a huge drop in usage and fell 1.98 points from 40.63 percent to 38.65 percent share. At first sight that is dramatic, but at a closer look, the drop fits nicely into the average, slightly slowing drop of IE share over the past year. In November, IE's share was somewhat inflated, likely due to a massive advertising campaign. That campaign ran out in December and IE continued to drop. Microsoft sees it differently and ignores IE share overall, but focuses on Windows 7, where IE9 is the most popular browser globally and in the U.S. Across all operating systems, however, we know that Chrome leads the charge.
Chrome, making a huge jump in December, was up 1.58 points or 6.15 percent to 27.27 percent, which gives it a 2 point lead over Firefox. December was the strongest month of growth for Chrome ever and concluded a year in which Google gained a staggering 42.5 percent of market share (11.59 points). Firefox halted its declined and gained 0.04 points to 25.27 percent. there were only two months in 2011 in which Firefox gained market share. Overall, Firefox dropped by 5.41 points and gave up 21.4 percent of its usage share.
The 6-month trend of browser market share indicates that IE losses are accelerating (IE lost 3.82 points in H2 versus 3.53 points in H2), while Mozilla's losses are somewhat stable (2.68 points in H2 versus 2.73 points in H1). The introduction of silent updates for IE in H1 of 2012 and the launch Windows 8 will be critical events for Microsoft and largely determine how low IE's share can sink. Google will more and more rely on advertising campaigns to support Chrome growth and could gain substantially more share if Chrome OS shows signs of success. Mozilla's future is unclear, but we know that it will receive about $1 billion from Google in royalties funding that it can use to invest in its browsers and fix problem areas such as its current rapid release cycle implementation as well as feature delays.
I doubt you will see Apple ever eat into the Microsoft's 95% of OS share on the PC market. Microsoft's biggest buyer of their products happens to be corporations.
I have to use IE for work related stuff, but I always have chrome open as well at work for browsing the web.
IE9 really isn't that bad though.
I doubt you will see Apple ever eat into the Microsoft's 95% of OS share on the PC market. Microsoft's biggest buyer of their products happens to be corporations.
It seems you're looking at that graphic wrong (Job's legacy, maybe)... One can only see Safari flat-lining along Opera at the bottom. If you see that as market gain, then I have a bridge to sell you.
Zenmaster is raising an interesting point there! Could be true!
Also, what about those applications which install Chrome by default, unless you go for a custom install? Have you updated Adobe Flash player recently? Guess what, it does that too! Wonder how many people have Chrome because of these bundles. (Of course, they have to keep using it once it's installed, to get into these statistics. Still, I find these sneaky bundles repulsive).
All I care about is some standardisation! Or secretly hoping one takes full control of the market so we don't need to be designing for 4 different (sorry Opera) browsers every time we want to develop an application for the web.
This is why we have USB drives with Firefox/Chrome/Opera installers on them so we never should have to touch the vile-ness that is IE
But in all seriousness I haven't really used IE since IE 6/7. So there may have been lots of improvement since then, but the early days left a bitter taste so I doubt I will willing use IE ever again. Chrome is nice but there is no x64 build of it that i can find. So I am sticking to firefox x64 for the foreseeable future. ^_^
You know, you're absolutely right! That is, if you think increasing market share by 50% (from 4 to 6) in less than 18 months is flat-lining.
Apple keeps creeping up, like that fungus on your back.
I hate to tell you this, but Apple is, and has been taking market share from Microsoft for quite some time. There was a time they were less than 2%, but year after year they keep eating Microsoft alive. My guess is they will keep doing it for a few more percentages, because Apple never wants a big market share (because it implies a price that would allow that), but even the 4% or so Apple has taken from Microsoft hurts, bad. That's 4% of a HUGE market, and the trend keeps continuing, even as the PC becomes a smaller component (with tablets and smart phones taking up a greater portion the last few years) of the market.
I would expect Apple's top market share to be around 10%, maybe less. But, with smart phones and tablets, a place Microsoft can't compete in, it's clear Apple is gaining in a lot of directions.
Without Jobs though, it might reverse. Tablets might fade like netbooks. iPhone is probably safe for a while, but without Jobs it may lose what makes it special, and lose market share. The Mac seems the safest, since it's very reliable (wins year after year), very attractive (I saw a server today, and thought how attractive it was, and then saw the Apple logo. They just get that part right), and also has huge "chic" appeal to hipsters.
Microsoft has nowhere to go but down. In processors, we have excellence. In OS's, we have Microsoft's pathetic, bloated, buggy rubbish, or Apple's overpriced, Unix-based, also bloated, rubbish. We need a third party. It's hard to enter, but the competition is really weak.