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It is time once again to take stock of web browser statistics for my various sites, and see how they have changed since last time, back in March of 2010.

Here are the overall shares for March 2010 to June 2011:

• 45% MSIE
• 24% Firefox
• 13% Chrome (WebKit)
• 13% Safari (WebKit)
• 5% Others (1% Opera)

So for the past year, MSIE usage fell significantly (from 64%!), Firefox and Safari rose slightly, and Chrome rose significantly (out of the “Other” category). Since both Safari and Chrome use WebKit, WebKit has now passed Firefox's Gecko engine to become the second most widely used browser engine.

The Internet Explorer breakdown:

• 50% MSIE 8.0
• 31% MSIE 7.0
• 18% MSIE 6.0
• 2% MSIE 9.0

Firefox:

• 68% Firefox 3.6
• 18% Firefox 3.5
• 6% Firefox 4.0
• 5% Firefox 3.0
• 2% Firefox 2.0
• 2% Firefox 5.0

Firefox 2.0 and 3.0 have now all but disappeared. Both 4.0 and 5.0 are simply too new to have garnered much share. It remains to be seen if 4.0 ever garners much share, or if users got directly to 5.0 (or 6.0, or…).

Safari:

• 40% Safari 5.0
• 18% Safari 4.0
• 17% Safari 4.0 Mobile
• 12% Safari 5.0 Mobile
• 5% Safari 4.1
• 4% Safari 5.1
• 5% Safari 3.0–3.2

The total mobile share has jumped from 20% last year to 29% this year. Safari 5.0 did not appear on last year's chart at all.

I did not include a by-version breakdown of Chrome share this year; maybe next year. Because Chrome self-updates in the background, I would expect that the latest couple of versions to dominate.

Okay, it has now been a year since I published web browser statistics for my various sites, so this seems like a good time to take stock of how things have changed over the past year.

Take Internet Explorer 6 users (please!), for instance. Surely their numbers have fallen?

Here are my overall numbers for March 2009 to March 2010:

• 64% MSIE
• 20% Firefox
• 10% Safari
• 6% Others (3% Chrome, 2% Opera)

So for the past year, MSIE usage actually increased, Firefox and Safari fell; Others held their own.

The Internet Explorer breakdown:

• 38% MSIE 6.0
• 36% MSIE 7.0
• 26% MSIE 8.0

MSIE 8 has now been released for just over 12 months; and yet, it is only the third most popular version of Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer is the only browser with an upside-down adoption rate. Last year, MSIE 7 was the most popular version; this year, perversely, it is MSIE 6. MSIE 6 went up six points compared to last year.

Sigh.

Firefox:

• 42% Firefox 3.5
• 42% Firefox 3.0
• 8% Firefox 2.0
• 7% Firefox 3.6

Firefox 3.6 has only been out for about two months, so it’s on track for a 42% share of the Firefox segment. Firefox 2.0 had the most share last year, at 48%. Quite a contrast with MSIE.

Safari:

• 57% Safari 4.0
• 15% Safari 4.0 (mobile – iPhone/iPod Touch)
• 10% Safari 3.2
• 6% Safari 3.1
• 5% Safari 3.1 (mobile)
• 7% Safari 3.0, 4.1, and 2.x

iPhone/iPod share has increased slightly, from 15 to 20%. A year ago, 3.2 was new, and version 3.1 had the largest share.

Effective today, I have ended support for Internet Explorer 6 over at my software site, http://banasmoo.com. That browser is now about eight years old, and woefully out-of-date. IE 8, released in March 2009, while not perfect, is considerably better than both IE 6 and IE 7. I would urge all IE 6 users to upgrade to IE 8, or consider switching to another browser altogether — such as Safari or Firefox.

My other sites will continue to support IE 6 for a little longer, however I expect to end support on all of my sites by January 1, 2010.

There are a few marketing numbers for browser share published from time to time, however individual sites can certainly vary. I thought it would be interesting to share some statistics about visitors to my sites (danwright.info, banasmoo.com, photography.danwright.info, and dan-anna.com).

As of this writing, Microsoft Internet Explorer version 8.0 has been publicly released for a week or so (the samples that follow include pre-release versions of IE 8). Safari 3.2 was released in November 2008, and the Safari 4.0 beta (pre-release) has been out for less than a month.

From February 2008 to March 2009, browser share was as follows:

• 56% MSIE
• 24% Firefox
• 14% Safari
• 6% Others

Internet Explorer share by version:

• 64% IE 7.0
• 33% IE 6.0
• 3% IE 8.0 (including betas)

Firefox:

• 48% Firefox 2.0
• 46% Firefox 3.0
• 4% Firefox 1.5
• 3% Firefox 1.0

Safari:

• 41% Safari 3.1 (desktop)
• 16% Safari 3.2 (desktop)
• 13% Safari 3.0 (desktop)
• 12% Safari 3.1 (mobile – iPhone/iPod Touch)
• 6% Safari 3.0 (mobile)
• 6% Sarari 4.0 (desktop; beta)
• 5% Safari 2.x (or older)

Phew. I’m very nearly done working on the wedding site. I’m currently working on a post describing my web site template system, smoot, designed over the past month and getting it‘s first “live” test over at the new site. I plan to publish that post in the next few days.

The site has really progressed fairly easily. Using smoot has made it much easier to separate the two basic tasks of web site production (design and publishing). This has allowed me to focus more of my time on a web-based RSVP system (yes, Evite can do this, but it’s far too informal and impersonal for a wedding).