Despite three months of sluggish growth, Firefox is back on its merry way to closing in on the Goliath that is Microsoft's Internet Explorer. In reality, the #2 Internet browser still has a long ways to go, but with recent news of its 100 millionth download and the release of a trial version of its upgraded browser, Firefox seems to be headed in the right direction.
According to NetApplications, which offers website statistical services, Firefox averaged 8.59% of the web browser market in October, with the market share peaking at 8.65% during the last week of the month. This was a strong improvement on the 7.55% market share that Firefox had in September. Microsoft's IE owned 86.52% and 86.87% during October and September, respectively. Apple's Safari browser also made strong gains during the two months, increasing its share of the market from 2.39% to 2.56%.
OneStat, another website traffic analyst, cites different numbers, recently claiming that Firefox's global market share is 11.5%.
Vince Vizzaccaro, the executive vice president of marketing and strategic relationships at NetApplications, recently stated that "Firefox enjoyed a tremendous first six months of 2005, starting at 2.69% market share in January and peaking at 8.71% in June, with its crescendo of 8.65% in the final week of October."
Since its launch in November 2004, Firefox has accumulated over 45 million users according to the Mozilla Foundation. Firefox's rapid progress and popularity, along with its position as the only viable threat to Microsoft IE's long-standing hegemony has garnered the attention and interest of Internet users across the globe. Add Google into that mix and it appears that Firefox has found a formula for stable and long-standing growth.
Google is the default homepage and search engine for Firefox, which indicates why Google would have an interest in Firefox's success. Recent news of Google's intimate dealings with Firefox supports this notion.
In order to improve the open source Web browser's tabs, Google has begun funding efforts to find ways to improve this feature on Firefox's browser. Firefox's tabbed browsing allows web surfers to open several sites in the same window, a feature that has been attributed as one of the main reasons for users switching over to Firefox.
Surprisingly, and likely to the dismay of Microsoft, Google, not Mozilla, has been holding usability studies to research and understand how people react to tabs in Firefox 1.5 Beta 1. In response to certain issues brought up by people who took part in the studies, Google, who employs some of Mozilla's developers, has created test versions of Firefox with alterations to the tabs.
Google has also revealed a new "Referrals" program, which is part of its AdSense advertising service. This program allows site owners to earn $1 every time someone downloads Firefox through a special button placed on their webpages.
Being #2 isn't so bad after all, especially if Google is by your side.
Sources:
Firefox use soars to 11 per cent
Firefox Share Rises Again
Google Gets More Cozy with Firefox
Google Gets More Cozy with Firefox
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