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A rough estimation of usage share of layout engines/web browsers
This article aims to be an unbiased historical record for the usage share of web browsers (but ideally layout engines, as it is what matters), based on statistics and articles published by well-known websites. One of the uses of such statistics is to create a graph that roughly represents the browser wars. This also serves as a reference for the various web browser articles.
This article is not all-inclusive or necessarily up-to-date. While the record was achieved unbiased, the record itself may not totally reflect the fact (i.e., there may be certain degrees of overestimation and underestimation). It also does not account for the regional differences in market share.
[edit] In general
Usage share, in web browser statistics, is the percentage of visitors to a group of web sites that use a particular browser. For example, when it is said that Internet Explorer has 85% usage share, it means that Internet Explorer is used by 85% of visitors that visit a given set of sites. Typically, the user agent string is used to identify which browser a visitor is using.
[edit] Overestimation and underestimation
Note that measuring browser usage in terms of the number of requests (page hits) made by each user agent can be misleading. Not all requests are generated by a user, as a user agent can make requests at regular time intervals without user input. In this case, the usage of that user agent would then be overestimated. Some examples:
- A web browser that refreshes the webpage at a regular time interval.
- A feed reader that requests the RSS/Atom feed at a regular time interval.
- Extra files like CSS hacks and JavaScript hacks are often sent to Internet Explorer as it contains a number of bugs and does not support W3C standards fully.
- Gecko based browsers do link prefetching which increases hits.
It is also possible to underestimate the usage share, for example:
- A graphical browser typically results in more requests than a text browser, as it downloads files referred to by the HTML document (e.g., image, CSS, and JavaScript).
- A computer with more memory will likely cache more webpages in memory, resulting in fewer requests.
- Many Browsers and Download managers spoof a different user agent string to the Web server to prevent erroneous/malicious browser sniffing which could result in receiving broken/incompatible code, or being completely blocked, thus increasing the statistics for other browsers.
- Most recent browsers block third-party spyware.
- Text/audio-based browsers don't download any webbugs at all.
- Privacy-enhancing proxies like privoxy are getting widely deployed by security-conscious sysadmins.
These problems could be avoided by using measures in terms of unique visitors to web sites rather than page hits. This can be achieved by using IP address and cookies. However, many web statistics software that only gathers data from the web server logs does not provide this kind of measurement.
[edit] 1999 and earlier
[edit] GVU WWW User Survey
[edit] Dataquest
[edit] International Data Corporation
[edit] ZD Market Intelligence
[edit] Zona Research
[edit] AdKnowledge
[edit] 2000 to present
[edit] WebSideStory
USA usage share data from: WebSideStory
| Date |
Internet Explorer |
Mozilla / Netscape |
Mozilla Firefox |
Source |
| February 8, 1999 |
64.60% |
33.43% |
|
February 22, 2001 |
| March 1, 1999 |
66.90% |
31.21% |
|
March 2, 1999 |
| April 6, 1999 |
68.75% |
29.46% |
|
April 7, 1999 |
| August 2, 1999 |
75.31% |
24.68% |
|
August 9, 1999 |
| June 18, 2000 |
86.08% |
13.90% |
|
February 22, 2001 |
| February 21, 2001 |
87.71% |
12.01% |
|
| April 25, 2001 |
86.61% |
13.10% |
|
May 1, 2001 |
| October 25, 2001 |
89.03% |
10.47% |
|
October 31, 2001 |
| August 26, 2002 |
95.97% |
3.39% |
|
August 28, 2002 |
| June 4, 2004 |
95.48% |
3.53% |
December 13, 2004 |
| October 8, 2004 |
93.21% |
3.05% |
2.66% |
| November 5, 2004 |
92.89% |
2.95% |
3.03% |
Feb. 28, 2005 |
| December 3, 2004 |
91.80% |
2.83% |
4.06% |
| January 14, 2005 |
90.28% |
2.64% |
4.95% |
| February 18, 2005 |
89.85% |
2.47% |
5.69% |
| April 29, 2005 |
88.86% |
2.23% |
6.75% |
May 10, 2005 |
| September 23, 2005 |
88.46% |
1.69% |
7.86% |
September 27, 2005 |
| November 4, 2005 |
88.16% |
1.61% |
8.13% |
November 10, 2005 |
| January 5, 2006 |
87.63% |
|
8.88% |
Jan. 12, 2006 |
| June 2006 |
86.64% |
|
9.95% |
July 19, 2006 |
| Date |
Internet Explorer |
Mozilla / Netscape |
Mozilla Firefox |
Source |
[edit] TheCounter.com
Global usage share data from: TheCounter.com Global Statistics
| Date |
Internet Explorer |
Netscape Navigator |
Mozilla / Netscape |
Opera |
Safari |
Source |
| Q1 2000 |
79.09% |
19.25% |
0.00% |
0.13% |
|
Jan 2000, Feb 2000, Mar 2000 |
| Q2 2000 |
80.30% |
17.54% |
0.02% |
0.12% |
|
Apr 2000, May 2000, Jun 2000 |
| Q3 2000 |
82.76% |
14.35% |
0.04% |
0.14% |
|
Jul 2000, Aug 2000, Sep 2000 |
| Q4 2000 |
83.95% |
12.61% |
0.14% |
0.14% |
|
Oct 2000, Nov 2000, Dec 2000 |
| Q1 2001 |
86.80% |
9.84% |
0.30% |
0.22% |
|
Jan 2001, Feb 2001, Mar 2001 |
| Q2 2001 |
87.99% |
7.46% |
0.27% |
0.28% |
|
Apr 2001, May 2001, Jun 2001 |
| Q3 2001 |
88.43% |
6.49% |
0.26% |
0.31% |
|
Jul 2001, Aug 2001, Sep 2001 |
| Q4 2001 |
90.83% |
5.23% |
0.71% |
0.36% |
|
Oct 2001, Nov 2001, Dec 2001 |
| Q1 2002 |
92.40% |
4.67% |
0.93% |
0.52% |
|
Jan 2002, Feb 2002, Mar 2002 |
| Q2 2002 |
92.47% |
4.13% |
1.13% |
0.82% |
|
Apr 2002, May 2002, Jun 2002 |
| Q3 2002 |
93.32% |
3.04% |
1.36% |
0.94% |
|
Jul 2002, Aug 2002, Sep 2002 |
| Q4 2002 |
93.94% |
2.31% |
1.67% |
0.83% |
|
Oct 2002, Nov 2002, Dec 2002 |
| Q1 2003 |
94.18% |
1.77% |
2.15% |
0.65% |
|
Jan 2003, Feb 2003, Mar 2003 |
| Q2 2003 |
94.43% |
1.45% |
2.22% |
0.66% |
|
Apr 2003, May 2003, Jun 2003 |
| Q1 2004 |
94.28% |
0.36% |
2.70% |
0.52% |
|
Jan 2004, Feb 2004, Mar 2004 |
| Q2 2004 |
95.04% |
0.32% |
2.37% |
0.51% |
0.67% |
Apr 2004, May 2004, Jun 2004 |
| Q3 2004 |
92.70% |
0.20% |
3.57% |
0.65% |
0.73% |
Jul 2004, Aug 2004, Sep 2004 |
| Q4 2004 |
90.98% |
0.18% |
5.10% |
0.68% |
0.77% |
Oct 2004, Nov 2004, Dec 2004 |
| Q1 2005 |
90.77% |
0.11% |
5.73% |
0.54% |
1.00% |
Jan 2005, Feb 2005, Mar 2005 |
| Q2 2005 |
90.90% |
0.09% |
6.02% |
0.51% |
0.99% |
Apr 2005, May 2005, Jun 2005 |
| Q3 2005 |
87.58% |
0.07% |
8.42% |
0.67% |
1.60% |
Jul 2005, Aug 2005, Sep 2005 |
| Q4 2005 |
87.25% |
0.07% |
8.60% |
0.71% |
1.83% |
Oct 2005, Nov 2005, Dec 2005 |
| Q1 2006 |
90.01% |
0.05% |
6.77% |
0.58% |
1.40% |
Jan 2006, Feb 2006, Mar 2006 |
| Q2 2006 |
86.32% |
0.05% |
9.03% |
0.70% |
1.89% |
Apr 2006, May 2006, Jun 2006 |
| Q3 2006 |
84.48% |
0.06% |
10.56% |
0.73% |
2.27% |
Jul 2006, Aug 2006, Sep 2006 |
| Q4 2006 |
84.22% |
0.05% |
11.05% |
0.60% |
2.77% |
Nov 2006, Dec 2006 |
| Date |
Internet Explorer |
Netscape Navigator |
Mozilla / Netscape |
Opera |
Safari |
Source |
[edit] OneStat.com
Global usage share data from OneStat.com
| Date |
Internet Explorer |
Netscape Navigator |
Netscape |
Mozilla |
Opera |
Safari |
Source |
| April 29, 2002 |
96.6% |
2.1% |
0.7% |
|
0.5% |
|
2002-04-29 |
| June 21, 2002 |
95.3% |
1.9% |
1.5% |
0.4% |
0.7% |
|
2002-06-24 |
| September 30, 2002 |
94.9% |
1.2% |
1.8% |
0.8% |
0.9% |
|
2002-09-30 |
| December 16, 2002 |
95.0% |
1.1% |
1.9% |
1.1% |
0.8% |
|
2002-12-16 |
| February 3, 2003 |
95.2% |
1.0% |
1.9% |
1.2% |
0.7% |
0.11% |
2003-02-03 |
| July 28, 2003 |
95.4% |
0.6% |
1.9% |
1.6% |
0.6% |
0.25% |
2003-07-28 |
| January 19, 2004 |
94.8% |
|
|
1.8% |
0.8% |
0.48% |
2004-01-19 |
| May 28, 2004 |
93.9% |
|
|
2.1% |
1.02% |
0.71% |
2004-05-28 |
| November 22, 2004 |
88.90% |
|
|
7.35% |
1.33% |
0.91% |
2004-11-22 |
| February 28, 2005 |
87.28% |
|
1.11% |
8.45% |
1.09% |
1.21% |
2005-02-28 |
| April 27, 2005 |
86.63% |
|
1.08% |
8.69% |
1.03% |
1.26% |
2005-04-27 |
| November 2, 2005 |
85.45% |
|
0.26% |
11.51% |
0.77% |
1.75% |
2005-11-02 |
| January 2006 |
85.82% |
|
0.16% |
11.23% |
0.77% |
1.88% |
2006-01-31 |
| May 2006 |
85.17% |
|
0.15% |
11.79% |
0.79% |
2.02% |
2006-05-15 |
| July 2006 |
83.05% |
|
0.16% |
12.93% |
1.00% |
1.84% |
2006-07-09 |
| October 2006 |
85.85% |
|
0.12% |
11.49% |
0.69% |
1.61% |
2006-10-09 |
| November 2006 |
85.24% |
|
0.11% |
12.15% |
0.69% |
1.61% |
2006-11-06 |
| Date |
Internet Explorer |
Netscape Navigator |
Netscape |
Mozilla |
Opera |
Safari |
Source |
[edit] ADTECH
[edit] Net Applications
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Chuck Upsdell's Browser Stats lists web stats from many different stats sources and gives the approximate current usage share of the most popular layout engines.
- W3Schools' Browser Statistics lists the web stats only from the W3 Schools site, which gives the approximate usage share of browsers among "people with an interest for web technologies."
