Chrome and others nibble away IE usage
Google's Chrome is still the fourth-place browser in terms of usage, but it gained more than others in October when it comes to stealing usage away from the dominant Internet Explorer.
According to Net Applications' browser usage share statistics, Chrome gained from 3.2 percent to 3.6 percent from September 2009 to October. The company bases its statistics on visits to a global network of 40,000 Web sites, dusted with some statistical processing.
Next was Mozilla's Firefox, which rose from 23.8 percent to 24.1 percent. Apple's Safari rose from 4.2 percent to 4.4 percent. Opera was essentially flat at 2.2 percent.
The big loser was IE, which dropped from 65.7 percent to 64.6 percent, according to the statistics.
Net Applications' September 2009 browser usage share statistics.
(Credit: Net Applications)
Net Applications' October 2009 browser usage share statistics.
(Credit: Net Applications)Chrome's early gains are notable--the software has only been publicly available for 14 months. But Google's challenge in spreading the software will gradually change as the supply of experimental early adopters peters out and the company must look to the slower-moving mainstream crowd for growth.
Although a few tenths of a percent may appear small, they represent large numbers considering how many people actually use browsers. The absolute number of users is relevant to Web developers dealing with customer support questions from people who might experience browser incompatibilities.
Speaking of incompatibility, one interesting statistic deeper in the Net Applications figures is the growing use of IE 8's compatibility mode, a feature introduced to help the new browser handle Web sites that are coded for IE 7 or before. In a departure from earlier versions, IE 8 by default tries to conform to Web standards to display Web pages--which can cause problems with Web sites built not for those standards but for those earlier versions of IE. The compatibility mode seeks to smooth over this discontinuity.
In September, 2.3 percent of usage was with IE 8 using compatibility mode. In October, that increased slightly to 2.4 percent.
IE 6 still is the dominant version of Microsoft's browser, with 23.3 percent usage. That version is built into Windows XP and was first released in 2001. IE 7, at 18.2 percent, is on the brink of being surpassed by IE 8 at 18.1 percent.
Chrome offers an interesting contrast to IE's slow change rate. By default, Google upgrades the browser automatically without giving people any say-so. That might cause some heartburn among some, but it rapidly distributes security patches and new features. To Google, Chrome version numbers are for bookkeeping in the background, not for splashing prominently in front of users.
In September, Chrome 2.0 was the leading version, with 1.7 percent usage compared to 1.2 percent for Chrome 3.0.
In October, though, Chrome 3.0 had taken over with 3.1 percent share. Chrome 4.0 is rising, but it's still only available as a rough developer preview version while Google programmers work on Mac and Linux versions mature enough to be called beta software.
Stephen Shankland writes about a wide range of technology and products, but has a particular focus on browsers and digital photography. He joined CNET News in 1998 and since then also has covered Google, Yahoo, servers, supercomputing, Linux and open-source software, and science. E-mail Stephen, or follow him on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/stshank. 
Of course, I did remove it from Windows 7 because I simply do not use it anymore except for a very few 'archival' things, which I have a separate computer to do that on when I need IE8.
Actually if IE8 conformed to web standards why is there a "Compatibility" View that was never on any other browser?
My company's ISP website doesn't display properly on IE8 when users select "Yes" for the "Mixed Security Content" pop-up - the best part is the reason it doesn't display is that they double negatived it from the previous pop-up, and removed the "Don't ask this question" again... so our website is now plagued with thousands of IE8 pop-ups that disable content in our webpages... how do we stop it? Well we have to, on a customer to customer basis, walk customers through enabling mixed content in their security settings.... or have them us another browser - we've written to MS about this... they do not care. The issue doesn't even occur on FF, and IE8 created this problem for us - we don't feel we need to spend several thousand to redesign our site because MS decided to change something on their browser - and we won't.
As to your website 'not displaying properly' on IE8.... what's the name of your website so I can check myself? The last time I heard that from someone, I checked the site myself and found out that the problem wasn't with IE8..... it was with the ****-poor design of that website. Not saying that is the problem on your website, but it might well be if I had the address and could look at it's code.
Now, if your site works in Firefox and Chrome.... if you were using the old 'IE6-necessary strange coding stuff'.... remove it from your website, with IE8 that stuff is KNOWN to cause problems.
To t8.... IE8 is not anymore prone to crashing than Firefox or Chrome is. It DOES get stuck for a minute or two on some sites that have 'strange' scripting on them (MSN.com amazingly is one of them!), but it doesn't usually crash.
In fact, the usual 'crashes' I have seen were from me getting tired of waiting for IE8 to get it's act together, and JUST as I use Task Manager to close it...... it goes to the website and I am sitting there going "NOOOOOOOO!" to be totally honest about it.
IE8 is pretty good.. It does have a long way to go to conform to web standards but.... then again, so does Firefox (though nowhere NEAR as far as IE8).
Stephen Shankland, the next time you are writing an article, just give Leo a call so you don't misinform us again.
How does Microsoft demand that you use IE on Windows?
Besides the fact that you can't update in any browser that's not IE?
Just this weekend I installed my $30 windows 7 upgrade and immediately installed firefox (plus chrome and opera, since I like messing with them sometimes) with no problem. I deleted the IE icon, and haven't thought about it since (I keep it around in the rare case something requires active x).
Don't get me wrong, I think IE is a steaming pile of garbage compared to Firefox and Opera (I joke the only thing it is good for is for downloading firefox), but I'm certainly not deluded into thinking I'm being forced to use it.
Windows Update doesn't require a browser. That was true in Vista and it's true in Win7. So to repeat Lennron's question -- how does Microsoft demand that you use IE on Windows?
In Windows XP, you need IE's ActiveX to run Windows Update. However, in Vista and WIndows 7, Windows Update is built directly into Control Panel and doesn't require IE at all. (Don't get me wrong: I HATE IE, especially since I am a web developer and my valid xhtml sites don't display right in that browser)
Haha. Thank all three of you. And I wouldn't be surprised if you could not update Windows through any other browser (I could test this, but it's irrelevant.) But not only is it true that you don't use the browser at all to update in Vista or Windows 7, even in XP if you have the automatic updates on, you still can update without the browser.
Any way you want to spin it, it's a moot point, because as it has been pointed out, windows has had automatic updating built in since at least windows xp. Updating via web browser is completely unnecessary. Go troll somewhere else random_walk and michichael. There are plenty of windows 7 articles where you could more effectively troll.
Google for "Microsoft Antitrust", then get back to me :)
...or pay the hefty licensing fees for it.
http://tr.im/E2D0
Also, trying to discern browser IDs via user-agent strings and spoofing is a clusterf-ck, at best. (Of course, when you're the monopolist browser, you never have to spoof, all other competing browsers need to spoof -- in the beginning -- because shortsighted developers are (were) only using development tools tied to that majority browser. Most are only know learning the usefulness, time-savings, and power of web-standards coding (with HTML5 starting to roll now).
http://www.virtuelvis.com/archives/2005/05/statistics-nonsense
Isn't it fun how that works?
How did Firefox look after their first 18 months? This is weak for Chrome I think.
and besides that Chrome is taking on the evil IE and the new popular guy Firefox and still doing well while firefox only had to win people away from the evil IE that everyone already hated
Also, most security tests show IE being the strongest.
However, that doesn't mean I can't think IE is a steaming pile of crap. I'll grant, it does work fine for many things, but it's lack of features and plugins compared to browsers like firefox does alot of damage to it amongst savvier users. Even worse is the terrible UI and menu/options setup, again, compared to browsers like firefox and opera. MS has some good products, but IE is not one of them.
"With a good anti-virus product"... I can run Chrome with NO ANTIVIRUS and not feel scared.
you say people are too "ignorant" to realize IE has certain features and you just admitted you had "to test" searching from the address bar to know that it works
that has been a feature of every browser for a very long time
now who is ignorant?
and as far as IE being the most secure for security you have just plain lost your marbles
Two words: ACID3 test.
________________________
Four words: NOT OF ANY USE! To espouse further, not of any usage to most people, considering that most things in ACID3 are not used by ANY websites yet that I have found.
by jake3373 November 2, 2009 12:48 PM PST
@lerianis
"With a good anti-virus product"... I can run Chrome with NO ANTIVIRUS and not feel scared.
_____________________________________
Then you are an idiot, sir, to be blunt. The fact is that Chrome needs you to be running antivirus as well. I have had quite a few websites try to infect my machine through Chrome and NIS2010 caught it when Chrome itself didn't.
Google's Chrome browser share growth trumps Firefox's
Microsoft's IE8 passes older IE7 for the first time, says Net Applications
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9140220/Google_s_Chrome_browser_share_growth_trumps_Firefox_s
The weird thing is - I'm not an early adopter, not of anything. I'm really not! For me, speed and ease of use are what matters. That's why I use Chrome.
IE6's rendering engine is far different than any other browser. We don't support most of our applications in IE6 because of the styling problems, but we do have a couple. Floating divs is a pretty common practice when setting up your css, but IE6 does it differently... scratch that.... improperly. IE6 also has issues with margins compared to proper engines. There is a long list, but those two have caused the most headaches for me.
While IE8 is much improved, I still run into extremely frustrating bugs. Last week I had a page with an unordered list, where the text could vary dynamically. We were using the UL and LI tags... very basic stuff. FF, Safari, Chrome and IE6 were all fine. But our testers found that IE7 and IE8 were inexplicably dropping the bullets off sometimes when the text was different and left-aligning all text in the list. The IE developer toolbar did not give any hints for a rogue style that could be overriding things. Since testing had to be complete that day, we ripped out the UL and LI tags and "manually" built the list by hard-coding in bullet characters inside DIVs and styling the indenting so it looked like an unordered list. I thought I had it looking good until we fired up IE6 and found that the broken box model was biting me. So we got it working in the end, with hacked-up crappy code that is bigger than the original (longer to load) and more difficult to understand. We spent two hours of pair-programming to pull it off, and left feeling like I needed a shower.
That's why web developers hate IE. I am convinced that MS has driven up the cost of doing business on the web.
Speed does not nesesarly means its the better browser imo. I can get the same speed using Adblock with Noscript in Firefox and anjoying many of the feautures at the same time.
besides, (Firefox 3.6 beta) is as fast now as Chrome is.
Not to say that I don't want to see Chrome get ahead in fight with the crapware that is M$ IE. but till Google adds an adblocker and other ad-on to Chrome I have to stay way from it. I am sorry but Firefox gives me all I need to enjoy Internet browsing.
Chrome was the only browser that couldn't be hacked at a recent security conference.
If a single tab crashes, it doesn't take down the whole browser, like it does with other browsers.
If you learned more about Chrome, you might like it too.
Other browsers are from operating system companies or Mozilla. Chrome is from the company with arguably the most to gain from cloud computing, and Chrome is changing rapidly, and Google has piles of extra money to throw at it. The features it lacks, with some exceptions, are ones I don't find myself pining for overmuch, but that's just me. The features it has--a minimal frame, speed, Gears, WebGL, and Native Client--are all very interesting to me. The extensions is coming along. That's certainly one of Firefox's biggest advantages, but with Firefox 4.0 getting Jetpack by default, there will be a big discontinuity for add-on developers.
All of these methods are used to compete with the speed demon: Chrome 3.0. Also, Firefox is speeding up its already-fast development cycle, which means that something's changed, and its not Opera or Safari, and definitely not IE... When Firefox is speeding up for something, you know there's something wrong (for Firefox). That happens to be Chrome. And don't tell me that I'm biased (except against IE8 *shudder*). I'm writing this from Firefox 3.5.4 and have Chrome installed on another computer, as well as Opera and Safari (Windows) on yet another.
Side-note: screws don't blunt, so its obviously someone else.
When I tried firefox 3.6 beta it crashed alot and there was no noticeable difference between 3.5 and 3.6. Its not faster than chrome.
Thats just from my experience
I require 3 things from my browser,
1. It has to work on all websites I may visit.
2. Easy portability of all my book marks.
3. NO TABS AT THE TOP OF MY WINDOW!!!
Putting tabs at the top of the screen is the stupidest idea that any code writer ever had. I refuse to use them there. If I can move them where I like them with a simple preference, I won't use your browser.
Until Firefox no longer works for me, I have no use for chrome.
- by queticomn November 2, 2009 7:20 PM PST
- Ahh, looks to me FireFox and Chrome grew at near stagnant rates. W3Counter gave FireFox a share of 31.89 %
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- by MeepMan November 3, 2009 4:42 PM PST
- Ignore China. Right now they're beginning the process of the same thing they did over 500 years ago: seal themselves off.
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- by queticomn November 4, 2009 10:42 AM PST
- @meepman
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (93 Comments)In all the median from all reporting statistical sources for September 2009 was, Internet Explorer: 58.37 % Mozilla FireFox: 31.34 % Safari: 4.07 % Chrome: 3.69 % Opera: 2.19 %
On a side note an interesting little factoid, Opera's share in Russia is 29% and growing. This represents a huge opportunity in a growing market such as Russia.
According to ADTECH chrome barely registers in Europe at a measly %1. A more global perspective tells the truth on the browser wars. Also from the little research i did, i found internet explorer's share in China (the potentially largest and fastest growing market, along with India) has shrunk to shrunk to 57.8 percent while Maxthon, Tencent TT and Qihoo360?s 360, now account for 31.1 percent of the country?s browser market, according to data by iResearch.
http://blog.mozilla.com/gen/2009/09/15/web-browser-marketshare-in-china/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers
Note: I might be going a bit extreme, but not too much.
China is second only to the United States in # of internet users and will prob-lye soon overtake the U.S..
Also, http://www.baidu.com/ is much more popular search engine in China then google, google is almost rejected in China. 75.7% percent of China's internet users use baidu as opposed to google's 19.8%.
Also with Opera's dominance in Russia another quickly growing internet market, i see a bright future for the Opera browser.