Must Read: Sorry, but bringing back the Start menu won't help Windows 8

Topic: Browser

Google says Chrome is slamming IE's market share

Summary: StatCounter, Net Applications, pah. The browser market share figures are weighted, inaccurate and vary day by day. Google, with a firm grasp of its own numbers, gave its assessment.

Zack Whittaker

By for Between the Lines |

The global browser numbers race between Chrome and Internet Explorer remains highly contested, but Google has sent the strongest signal yet that Chrome holds the crown as the Web browser leader.

Google Chrome senior vice president Sundar Pichai, speaking at D:10,. started off noting Chrome's growth:

"Chrome grew roughly 300 percent last year -- we have hundreds of millions of active users. We have many ways of looking at it. You can argue about the data, but in general I think we have gained substantial mindshare since we've launched the product."

Amid the hedging, he went on (emphasis mine)::

"I think it's fair to say that we are number one or number two in all countries in the world. It's fair to say that roughly a third of people are using Chrome; I think it's much more than a third in the consumer space. Most users in enterprise use IE because it takes a long time for that space to upgrade."

Pichai added:

"There are places where our share is over 50 percent today. I think the speed of Chrome is much more notable when you have a slow connection."

What could be seen as a bold statement could also be seen as a Dewey victory. Having said that, only Google knows exactly how many downloads it's had for Chrome, but downloads does not equal installs or active use.

Plus, at least one browser counter suggests Chrome really is in the lead.

StatCounter said Chrome overtook Internet Explorer in May, even after it took into account a pre-rendering adjustment. The research firm said the move did not have any "significant" impact on its statistics.

It currently sees Internet Explorer at 32.12 percent, with Chrome a fraction ahead at 32.43 percent.

It's also worth noting that it is not the first time Chrome has jumped ahead of Internet Explorer, according to the analytics firm. Chrome was the "world's top browser" for a single day on March 18. It's likely the figure jumped on the Sunday because the vast majority were at home and not at work, where Internet Explorer still dominates the work environment.

But it doesn't mean Internet Explorer can't recoup its losses and claw back the market share it's losing.

On the flip side, Net Applications pegs Internet Explorer at 54 percent with Firefox ahead of Chrome at 19.7 percent and 19.6 percent respectively.

Microsoft was unavailable for comment at the time of writing.

Image credit: Google. Transcript courtesy of Engadget.

Related:

Topic: Browser

Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily email newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.

Talkback

36 comments
Log in or register to join the discussion

  • About time

    This inevitability was long overdue with the other browsers fast upgrading themselves while IE was still stuck trying to shake off from its comfort during its monopoly days.
    JOB83
    Reply Vote

    • Errr.....

      Self upgrading browser for Chrome is required. After all, a new version to correct the vulnerabilities in the previous one is roughly every two weeks.
      In comparison, most of the other browsers get updated once every month to once every 2 months because they aren't buggy like Chrome.
      Check sans.org if you don't believe me.
      Gisabun
      Reply Vote

  • Okay ... but be careful what Zdnet wishes for, though

    The catch-up was inevitable, but don't drink the Zdnet kool-aid and cheer for another Google monopoly, this time in Chrome. Monopolies by ANYONE is bad for consumers, and yes, that includes Apple and Microsoft too. Keep it going, Firefox....
    D.J. 43
    Reply Vote

  • CHROME

    I have used them both for some time and find that chrome has many more problems when searching around the web. There are a lot of pages that do not display well. I will say that if you turn the page in google will fix the problem and fast but still there should not be that many! I like chrome but with the looks of windows 8 and the way it works there would be no reason to change IE to work more like chrome because it does not work the same in the metro style windows.
    imsimsj
    Reply Vote

  • Google says Chrome is slamming IE's market share

    When did .31% become known as slamming the competition? Google is getting a little bold with their statements. I won't use Chrome due to their TOS and from what I have seen its not the best browser. The person next to me is always yelling at chrome because the flash player keeps crashing. I never had that problem with IE or Firefox.
    Loverock Davidson-
    Reply Vote

    • Ya

      And I woul.dn't use Chrome because it's too buggy.
      Gisabun
      Reply Vote

    • Re: Google says Chrome is..

      Hi Loverock, can you elaborate a little more about the TOS comment? I've never used chrome, only IE and Safari.

      Thanks...
      TW
      T-Wrench
      Reply Vote

    • Did you read the actual quotes?

      Saying they've gained "substantial mindshare" and is used by about one-third of users out there isn't exactly "slamming" anyone. The journalist is just getting a little carried away, methinks.
      ChickenLiver
      Reply Vote

  • Chrome is slamming IE

    Kudos to Chrome.

    Choice brought to you by Google.
    daikon
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Choice brought to you by Google.

      Well, sort of. I downloaded Avast! Free anti-virus the other day and installed it on one of my systems yesterday to do a quick scan. During the Avast! install, there were two radio buttons at the bottom of the Window, one to install Chrome and the other to make it the default browser, both selected by default.

      Avast Software and other ISVs are giving Google Chrome a boost (in return for cash to help subsidize free apps). I wonder what percentage of users notice that installing unrelated software results in 1) Google Chrome being installed on one's system, and 2) Chrome being made the default web browser for one's system.

      IMO, this is sneaky behavior and is similar to the installation of adware.
      Rabid Howler Monkey
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Choice brought to you by Google

        Free anti-virus software not really free then.
        You where given the choice not to install addition software.
        daikon
        Reply Vote

      • Duh

        You ever thought that Google paid the developers of Avast to include it in there? Another reason why I don't like Avast [the other one is that it can't even pick up the fake AV malware correctly].
        Gisabun
        Reply Vote

      • Google also spams IE users with Chrome ads

        Google has an extremely dominant position in web search and does not sell advertising space on its home page. However, in Europe at least, for the last few years Google has been spamming IE users with a big Chrome ad on the Google home page. I remember trying it a couple of years back and the ad appeared in IE, but not in Chrome or Firefox. It's the usual misleading nonsense, with a message like 'search the web more quickly', and a button to install Chrome right below it. That's at least as anti-competitive as Microsoft's old practice of putting an IE icon on the Windows desktop. As far as I know, Microsoft allowed other browser icons to be added by PC makers (but that wasn't good enough). Google doesn't allow anyone else to advertise on its home page.
        WilErz
        Reply Vote

  • IE is more secure, faster, and more html/css compliant. And chrome slams

    user privacy. Im looking forward to IE10 being released for W7.
    Johnny Vegas
    Reply Vote

    • Chrome and Firefox are better for XP users

      Microsoft seems to have decided to leave the XP users behind, and rightly so in my view. If I were forced to use XP, however, I'd use Firefox or Chromium instead of the outdated IE8. On Windows 7 and 8, IE9 and IE10 are generally better.

      I do like the PDF support in Chrome, and I???d like to see it in desktop IE (without a slow, buggy Adobe plug-in). For Metro IE, however, keeping web browsing and PDF reading in separate apps is more coherent. The Windows 8 PDF reader could use some improvements in the UI (e.g. to configure defaults), and the Metro IE10 should have an option to open PDFs without prompting when a PDF link is clicked, but both IE and the PDF reader are very fast.
      WilErz
      Reply Vote

  • They all suck.

    I just stick with IE because I'm tired of wasting time and hard drive space trying to find something better. Seems like the latest 'new and improved' is just a shuffled 'try and find it now' version of the previous browser.
    Net-Tech_z
    Reply Vote

  • For now...

    Chrome works better than IE9 for me, so I made the move a while back. Chrome was just plain faster--faster to load, and faster to use.

    However, IE10 is going to be a game-changer. It loads fast, and renders pages at least as quickly as Chrome to my eye. And websites that were sluggish to navigate with IE9 work fine in IE10.

    So, Google had better stay on its toes; Microsoft isn't ready to give up yet.
    ParrotHead_FL
    Reply Vote

  • Been on Chrome from the start

    Love the automatic updates, fast page rendering and excelent security. MS shot themselves in the foot when they did not allow IE9 to load on XP. Yes many of us are still on XP. Cannot find any justification to waste 40 hours or so trying to get all of the stuff that just works now running on a Win7 box. As for home computing, my wife bought me on of those stupid iPad toys for Christmas two years ago. Thought I should at least take it out of the box and see what it did. 18 months later I only travel with the iPad (RDP works great)) and at home my PC is rarely if ever turned on. Changes are coming folks.
    dforst@...
    Reply Vote

  • IE make a comeback?

    Has a browser ever lost market share this much and gained any of it back? No. Internet Explorer is just another example of a slow to adapt big company like Microsoft. IE 10 is just IE 9 in Metro form. While I never totally liked Chrome as a whole I knew that its speed and simplicity would eventually kill IE and possible even Firefox. If Microsoft was smart it would buy Mozilla and leave the browser up to them. I'll bet with better support Mozilla could do better with Firefox. Microsoft should finally realize that you can't drag your feet while others pass you by and then try and play catch up.
    jscott418-22447200638980614791982928182376
    Reply Vote

    • And can Google can survive the coming crash?

      I am no Microsoft fan. Nor an Apple fan. Nor an Amazon fan.

      I just like to know their business strategies.

      Chrome and ChromeOS to a lesser extent so far exist to move back aggressive Bing and Facebook competitive action in the last 2 years so Google can keep or increment traffic hitting Google main site and affiliated sites.

      A similar strategy was/is used to kill other competitive vertical shopping sites, search sites, product ecommerce sites etc by Google. And the end result - the Internet is dying partly due to such actions while Google is accused or will be accused formally of having engaged in monopolistic and anti-competitive business practices in the search and search advertising markets (atleast the 2nd one).

      Google's problems are these -
      #1 The web browser market is relevant only on fixed devices like PCs. So if Microsoft's PC Windows division loses revenue or slows on revenue growth, then expect Google's CPC rates or whatever other metric and advertising turnover and revenue/profit per ad to go down. Facebook has a similar problem but Facebook has something strategic that Google does not - it is friendly to Apple and even to Microsoft.
      #2 Google's monopoly is in trouble - from the EU and US Justice department and FTC. So can they continue market practices that are distorting the market decline? May be they can. Since they follow Microsoft, looking at Microsoft and how it protected its monopolistic market position, so will Google. Or can it? Like will Google be ok if Facebook miraculously moves ad dollars more to social spending?
      #3 Most importantly - Android/ChromOS fail to convert mass adoption to mass revenue growth and profit generation and cash flow actually.

      What is Google's answer to these three strategic problems excluding its failed rivalry with Apple, Microsoft and Amazon and Facebook now?

      Chrome browser market share improvements through hardened marketing campaigns will only bring it so much mindshare but no revenue. The irony is this - Chrome browser adoption may actually be sited as another example of lock-in by the Google ecosystem preventing competing websites from becoming the default webpage. Just ask Mozilla how they feel about it.
      calahan
      Reply Vote
CNET Join | Log In | Privacy | Cookies Close