Below are some statistics for my website; the first shows Operating system visitors over cumulative time; the second is visitors Browsers over time. Note that the graphs do not take into account users fiddling with their browsers agent settings
so that they can, for instance, view MSIE only sites with Opera.
Of interest is that the sale of Linux ready PCs by Dell in late May hasn't had any impact on the statistics, and nor has the release
of Macintosh's Safari browser for windows in Mid June. In fact,
I've only seen 6 or 7 visitors with a Safari/Windows combination visiting my site (although this number was obtained by visually inspecting the site stats from time to time; given the difference between the number of Safari and the number of Mac users,
I may be wrong). It remains to be seen what impact Firefox 3, which has a massive
uptake (7 million+ downloads) in June 2008 will have on these stats, or indeed the release of MSIE 8 RC1 (Release Candidate 1)
on 26th January 2008, a day after the stats for this site were updated. Microsoft has already attempted to boost its update in a method akin to spamming.
Here is a graph showing non-cumulative OS visitors:
i.e. only for that month:
Note that certain data have been removed from the graphs to prevent them from appearing too cluttered; in practical terms, this means that only those lines showing dramatic trends up or down are included. Also, "other or unknown" means non-mainstream browsers and OSes, and not "other than those shown". For instance, lynx and not WebTV, Mozilla, Netscape, Sun, *BSD products.
Bold lines indicate that that particular browser or OS has at least 1% of the share
of the total statistics.
And here is one showing non-cumulative Browser visitors:
The graphs show a roughly linear allegiance between
total brands of browser and OS and time. For instance,
whenever the total consumer usage of Firefox 0.x, 1 and 1.5 drops,
Firefox 2 picks up by roughly the same amount. Perhaps
nothing to be surprised about really? If you have used
a particular browser and/or OS, and are impressed, why
should you change? If you've used a bad browser, you
might never be tempted to chance that flavour of browser
again....?
So, what could happen in the future? Well, I predict that Vista usage will increase at Christmas time,
as people receive the OS as a present, and the fuss over the driver incompatibility wanes. Slashdot also
ran a news report from Forbes saying that, with SCO's imminent collapse, enterprise companies may pick up
Linux as a viable Windows alternative, with the worry of bogus licenses. I'm unconvinced by this though. We'll
see.
Another thing that may cause an uptake in Vista's numbers is the delivery of SP1, slated for the first quarter of 2008, thereby just missing the Christmas market. The sale of Linux ready desktops by Wal-Mart in November 2007, and by PC manufacturers, such as Dell, does not seem to have affected the take-up of this OS, sadly. However, with XP's dominance yet to be usurped, it is interesting to note that some PC providers (PC World?) are providing a downgrade to XP if need be (XP is due to be "obsoleted" by Microsoft towards the end of June 2008). Some reports indicate that many new PCs are being bought with a Vista license, but with XP installed, or are being purchased, and then Vista being wiped from the hard drive to be replaced by the older OS. How things will fare with the new version of Windows, due in January 2010, is a good subject for conjecture.
Incidentally, the big spikes for Linux and Firefox 3 in the non-cumulative graphs (that is, graphs 3 and 4) for Month 17 is due to me inviting people to look at my access stats on the Slashdot website. So, I got visited by curious Linux/FF3 evangelists. The same thing happened in September for Linux when I placed an item on Slashdot regarding mistreatment in the workplace.
Oh, and a welcome to the latest browser, Google's Chrome 0.x, which made its debut at 15.55 GMT on my web stats on September 3rd, 2008.
stats are updated on, or about, the 25th of each month.
February 2009
A few items of news this month: first of all, the publically released beta/release candidate
of Windows 7 appeared on my stats on February 14th. It is being mooted for a late
2009 release, or early 2010 if the EU anti-trust conflicts with this scheduling.
Secondly, if my figures are anything to go by, MSIE 8 has had a very low acceptance by
the internet community. However, it is being bundled with OEM packages of Vista and XP
as from March.
MSIE 6 usage seems to be down. Not surprising as it is now obsolete, and also the Norwegian
finn.no started its campaign urging people to drop its use in mid February. We'll see.
People are sticklers for "what they know is best!" From my month0by-month numbers,
Firefox 3 is now the second most popular browser.
News of the Vista SP2 on 20th February 20th may help boost its user base...
...and the Safari 4 beta was released on 24th February, but there has been no sign yet
of the browser...
March 2009
MSIE 8 was officially released, on March 18th. Chrome 1 has virtually the same % share
as the new Microsoft browser. How Chrome's percentage will fare when an official Mac and Linux
release is announced (and not the "Chromium" experimental version) is unknown.
All the major browsers show an increase in useage this month, at the expense of the lesser known ones. Will this become an Explorer/Firefox/Safari/Chrome only battle? The Norwegian campaign against MSIE 6 does not seem to be picking up!
When it comes to OSs, Vista had a surge this month, with Linux and MacOS X losing out. There are many reasons for this, but the most obvious one is that people may have tried Linux/Mac and not liked them, reverting to Vista...?
A few ideas did occur to me:
Re: The Win 7 release candidate on May 7th: I do not expect much impact on this website from geeks who download it; there is not much here for the "nerds" to attract! *grin*
The much touted release of Win 7 on October 23rd, in time for Christmas surpringly, may yield
an increase for its stats.
The IE8 update sets the default browser to IE8; will this increase its usage stats?
There is speculation that many companies are waiting for Win 7 and will skip Vista completely.
Will companies Wait for Windows 7 SP1 ? Speculation seems to suggest that is the sign of
maturity when it will be picked up. This didn't happen for Vista though.....
Update: Early May.
News that Google has taken to advertising its Chrome browser on YouTube (at least in Japan),
and on the New York Times website may boost its user base. We'll see, when I next update
my stats at the end of this month.
An excellent website showing browser usage day-by-day is here
Some other news items:
The alpha version of Chrome for GNU/Linux and MacOS became available
at the end of May.
Microsoft will ship Windows 7 to Europe without IE; it will be up to re-sellers and PC vendors
to decide which browser to install. My prediction? Once Windows 7
becomes available on October 22nd, Vista usage will plummet. I suspect that
once this happens, IE 8 uptake will not rise as quickly as European markets
opt for Firefox et al. We'll see.
Update: Late July.
A busy month for browser and OS watchers!
On July 15th, there was the news that "Windows 7 flies off virtual shelf. Amazon said that sales of Windows 7 in the first eight hours it was available outstripped those of Windows Vista's entire 17 week pre-order period." At about this time, Google announced its own OS, to be released in 2010.
On that same day, came news that YouTube is discouraging users from IE6.
And then, the next day, came more news about Windows 7 in Europe: "WIndows clean install only in Europe due to EU regulations about browser dominancy." A few days later came notice that users will be presented of a choice of browser to use at start-up, so none of the chicken-and-egg argument: "How do I download a browser?" "Use a browser!" "But I haven't got a browser..."
Update: Late August
News that Windows 7 will be sold in Europe at a reduced price. The uptake of Windows 7 hasn't really manifested itself on my stats, but then, it isn't widely available yet.
On the OS front, there has been a small but noticeable increase in the use of vintage operating systems; Windows 95 and Windows ME, and to a greater degree, Windows 98.
MSIE 8 has had a good month. It has now jumped to a 20% share, and is the third most popular browser after Firefox 3 and MSIE 7. MSIE 6 has dropped significantly. MSIE 8's increased uptake is to the detriment of MSIE 6 and 7. Of amusing note is the fact that Firefox 3 hasn't been universally adopted as a replacement for Firefox 2 because of the newer browser's funtionality of showing users a listing of previously visited websites in the address bar when one types in a few characters of a URL ... seems some people don't want others to know they have been looking at porn!
By the way, these are the stats for the top performing OS and Browsers as of August 27th, 2009:
| Browser | % use |
| Firefox 3 | 27.27 (down 0.05) |
| Firefox 2 | 1.47 (up 0.67) |
| MSIE 8 | 19.83 (up 9.15) |
| MSIE 7 | 21.97 (down 7.15) |
| MSIE 6 | 13.47 (down 2.58) |
| Chrome 2 | 2.27 (down 0.8) |
| Chrome 1 | No users |
| Safari 4 | 0.12 (down 0.92) |
| Safari | 5.32 (up 1.80) |
| OS | % use |
| Windows 7 | 1.53 (up 0.03) |
| Windows Vista | 26.27 (up 5.53) |
| Windows XP | 55.89 (down 7.81) |
| Windows 2000 | 1.53 (up 0.44) |
| Windows 98 | 1.20 (up 1.02) |
| Mac OS X | 9.25 (up 1.80) |
| Macintosh | No users |
| Linux | 1.36 (down 0.89) |
Update: September 1st 2009
Opera 10.0 has just been released.
Update: October 26th 2009
Windows 7 was released early in UK (on October 20th, two days early). There are also indications that Germany and Israel also released it early too. Whether the early UK dispatch was because of the postal strike is not known. Funnily enough, the analysis of my stats showed that, during this period, the number of people using Windows 7 who visited my website dropped compared to previous time periods. Also, the large "spike" in Linux users for October (about 11%) is due mainly to my site being slashdotted.
Update: Mid December 2009
A few things to report. The first is that Facebook and Amazon are advertising Google's Chrome. The second is that Microsoft has agreed, via its Windows Update facility, to provide a ballot screen to allow users to select which browsers they want to use. And the date for this? March 2010. By then, Windows users will have chosen which browser they want to use and this will make no difference except to brand new Windows users. So, the EU, who forced this decision upon its European subjects have demonstrated that they are a toothless tiger. This should have been done before Windows 7 emerged. Now people will just click on "IE 8" on the ballot screen, or whatever browser they are used to. It won't force anyone to test drive another browser.
Update: January 16th, 2010
After a few Chinese Gmail accounts were illegally accessed due to a flaw in Internet Explorer, Germany is now advising its citizens to use a different browser.
Update: January 18th, 2010
....and now France has said the same thing: use another browser.
Update: January 30th, 2010
How many people use Google Docs? And how many people use it and IE6? From March 1st, you might find it wise to upgrade, or switch your browser!
Update: February 2nd, 2010
A petition in the UK is demanding that IE6 be dropped. Microsoft plan to support the browser until 2014.
Update: February 24th, 2010
YouTube plan to stop IE 6 support from March 13th. Upgrade now!
Update: March 5th, 2010
The BBC website is saying that, "Early reports suggest the [Windows] browser choice screen is leading to a rise in the numbers of people trying browsers other than Internet Explorer. In a statement, Opera said it had seen downloads of its browser increase threefold since the choice screen system started rolling out. "
Update: March 7th, 2010
Microsoft are using their UK Windows 7 TV adverts to inform people of MSIE 8. I don't know if this is the same in other countries.
Update: March 18th, 2010
More news from the BBC; Opera is doing well
Update: March 20th, 2010
IE9 won't be compatible with XP.
Update: May 4th, 2010
IE's share of the market slips.My figures for April are: IE- 53.0% Firefox - 30.3% Chrome - 6.8% Safari - 6.5% (including Safari for iPhone)
Update: May 27th, 2010
Despite Microsoft announcing only a few months ago that they had no plan to retire Internet Explorer 6, it seems that they have changed their mind. The description of IE6 as the world's most used browser is laughable!
Update: June 2nd, 2010
Google have announced that their Chrome OS will be launched late in the second half of this year. My initial optimism faded when I read that netbooks equipped with the OS will not a hard drive but will result in "The Cloud" for email etc. Great. Not everyone has net access, and not everyone has a connection fast enough to make distributed data-based applications feasible.
Update: July 24th, 2010
According to Google, we can expect Chrome 6, 7 and 8 this year. Chrome 6 has already appeared on my statistics, but its usage is low so far.
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