Microsoft's dwindling market share

Market share trends are interesting reports to watch, as they are a good forecast of where things are going. Once trends start to gain momentum, they have a tendency to stay on that path. What has been interesting is the amount of market share that Microsoft has been losing in various areas over the past few years. In web browsers, phones, and even desktop operating systems. The playing field is starting to level out, which is good for the consumers.

In the September 2010 report, NetMarketShare shows Microsoft IE and Windows at record lows within the past several years. The decline of IE is nothing new. Starting in 2006 with the numerous problems of Windows Vista, it seems that Firefox gained a lot of ground and started really making an appearance on the charts, at the expense of IE. As of September 2010, IE is at 59.65%, Firefox at 22.96%, Chrome at 7.98%, and the remaining bunch pulling up the rest. At first I thought IE might make a small recovery with the launch of Windows 7. However, I think the root cause of IE's decline is due to many factors, and users are opting out of using IE and using other browsers like Firefox and Chrome. So it appears that the operating system has nothing to do with browser trends. This makes a pretty big statement actually, because it means users are going out of their way to avoid the built-in browser (IE), and installing an alternative and making the switch. IE saw a very small increase in June and July of about 1%, right around the time Windows 7 was taking off, but after the dust settled, is back down to levels before June and is at a low. NetMarketShare seems to favor Microsoft the most of several trend providers. W3Schools.org, who tend to show lower Microsoft levels, show IE at 31.1%, Firefox at 45.1%, Chrome at 17.3%. At first this may seem unfathomable, however I checked reports from our own logs which shows IE at 41.86%, Firefox at 42.82%, and Chrome at 4.88%. It's clear that Microsoft is in trouble in the web browser wars.

What's also surprised me is the decline of Windows itself, which is Microsoft's prized possession. Windows still dominates the operating system market, but even with the release of Windows 7, is still declining. While Microsoft is reporting supposed record sales of Windows 7, Windows usage as a whole is declining. In September 2010, NetMarketShare showed Windows at 91.08% (declining), Mac OS X holding at 5.03%, Linux declining to .85%, and others holding up the rest. W3Schools.org shows Windows at 87.1% (declining), Mac OS X increasing to 7.2%, and Linux holding at 4.6%. It's not really the total market share percentage that Windows has that is interesting, but more with the declining trend.

What does this mean? What is Microsoft going to do about it? It will be interesting to see how things play out in the next couple of years.