Browser market share sees Chrome growing, Firefox stalled

Chrome is rapidly establishing itself as the third browser and statistics suggest that it is the browser benefiting from Internet Explorer's losses. Although data from the companies that sample browser usage on the web is not inherently reliable on its own, when the same trend is apparent from different sampling techniques, it becomes notable.

According to figures from Net Application's Net Marketshare, which tries to estimate the number of users as a basis for marketshare, Firefox apparently peaked in popularity last September with 22.97% share and has since drifted down to 21.67% in June this year. Chrome, on the other hand, is growing steadily, rising from 7.99% last September to 13.11%. In the background, Internet Explorer continues its collapse, from 59.62% in September to 53.68% in June.

By StatCounter's numbers, which are based on page impression share rather than estimated user share, the latest results see Chrome having risen from 9.24% a year ago to 20.65% in June. Over the same period, Firefox drifted down from 31.15% to 28.24% and Internet Explorer dived from 52.86% to 43.58%.

Whether Firefox can return to growth or if Chrome continues its growth, it does appear that open source based browsers are heading for domination; StatCounter's numbers point to an almost 49% share for open source browsers, and Net Application's numbers give them around 34% share of users.

(djwm)