Safari Tops 7 Percent in Nov, IE Drops Below 70

December 1st, 2008 at 9:42 AM - News by Jeff Gamet

Apple's Safari Web browser climbed up over a seven percent market share in November while Microsoft's Internet Explorer dropped below 70 percent for the first time. Safari managed to grab 7.13 percent of the browser market as it continued its upward trend, just as Internet Explorer continued its steady decline down to 69.7 percent, according to data from Market Share.

Firefox topped the 20 percent mark for the first time in November to grab 20.78 percent of the browser market. The free cross-platform Web browser had been holding steady just under 20 percent since June.

Google's Windows-only Chrome Web browser still hasn't pushed past the one percent mark and is sitting at 0.83 percent of the browser market. It looks like the small bit of the market Chrome has snatched isn't coming at the expense of Safari or Firefox.

The Safari and Firefox browsers have both been gaining ground for months while Internet Explorer has continually lost market share for well over a year even though it is the default browser on most Windows installations. The decline is likley an indication that many Windows users are hunting for alternatives to Interent Explorer.

While the statistics are handy for getting snapshot overviews of a particular Web browser's 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 that Google's Chrome isn't posing a serious threat yet.