Appleis Safari Web browser and Microsoftis Internet Explorer both maintained their marketshare trends in August: Safari gained and Microsoft lost. Safari inched up to 6.37 percent of the browser market, while Microsoft slipped to a new low for the year at 72.15 percent, according to data from Market Share.

Firefox continued its upward trend as well, moving from 19.22 percent of the browser market in July up to 19.75 percent in August.

Safari and Firefox have been on an upward swing for months as interest in both browsers continues to grow. In comparison, Internet Explorer has been losing market share to both for well over a year, which is likley an indication that many Windows users are hunting for alternatives to Microsoftis market dominating Web browser.

Safari, Firefox and Internet Explorer gained a new competitor in August when Google introduced its Chrome Web browser. Google Chrome is available as a public beta for Windows only, but will soon be available for Mac OS X and Linux as well. Interest in Google Chrome is already high even though it has been available for only a day, which could mean that Internet Explorer might face an even sharper dip in its control over the Web browser market in the coming months.

While the statistics are handy for getting snapshot overviews of a particular Web browseris popularity, looking at the numbers over time offers a better impression of overall popularity. In this case, the numbers seem to indicate a growing interest in Safari and Firefox at the expense of Internet Explorer, and next month may add Google Chrome to IEis rival list, too.