Microsoft's latest browser finally more popular than IE6

 

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Posted on 2 Feb 2010 at 10:06

The latest web browser market share figures show that Microsoft's latest browser, Internet Explorer 8 (IE8), finally overtook its older sibling IE6 in January.

IE6 was released with Windows XP in 2001, and has a reputation as one of the least secure and least compatible browsers on the market. Use of IE8 has risen since the launch of Windows 7, with which the browser is bundled, and Windows 7's own market share is growing rapidly, passing the 10 per cent mark at the end of January.

IE6 is so unpopular that a number of campaigns are ongoing with the intention of getting users to switch to a newer browser. Developers especially hate IE6 as its incompatibility with newer web standards means that they have to add extra code to their web pages to handle the way IE6 displays web pages. Google has recently announced that it will drop support for IE6 from Google Docs and Google Sites on March 1st, and it dropped support from YouTube last year.

The popularity of IE6 is mostly due to the fact that it came bundled with Windows XP, which is still the most popular version of Microsoft's operating system with two thirds of the market. As most users don't even know what a browser is, they are happy to continue using the software that came with their PC and aren't even aware of alternatives.

Google has made efforts to educate users as part of the launch of its Chrome browser, and the efforts seem to be paying off as Chrome has now passed five per cent market share. As well as eating into Internet Explorer's share, it also seems to be slowing down the progress of Firefox, the second most popular browser family after Internet Explorer. While Firefox's share has grown by two per cent over the last year, Chrome has jumped nearly four per cent.

Author: Barry de la Rosa