After 10 years, Google Chrome browser more popular than ever
TEN YEARS ago on Sept 1, Google launched its own web browser, Chrome. Ten years later, the application is used on two out of three of the world’s computers and one in every two mobile devices worldwide.
In a little less than four years, Google Chrome succeeded in unseating an institution, Internet Explorer, which for many years had no significant rivals in the sector. In 2012, Chrome became the world’s most popular web browser and since then it has consistently increased its lead over its competitors.
According to the website StatCounter, Google Chrome now accounts for 66.31 per cent of computer-based browsing, far ahead of Firefox (11.39 per cent), Internet Explorer (6.71 per cent), Safari (5.51 per cent) and Edge (4.7 per cent).
On mobile devices (smartphones and tablets), Chrome also leads the field. Let’s not forget that Chrome is installed on all machines running Android, which account for the bulk of this sector, and only a few users opt to make use of an alternative mobile browser.
With this in mind, StatCounter estimates that Chrome has a 53.32 per cent share of this market worldwide, far ahead of the iPhone and iPad application Safari (22.22 per cent). Trailing far behind, there is UC Browser (10,29 per cent), which is nonetheless very popular in Asia, and Samsung Internet (4.92 per cent), the alternative developed by the world’s leading smartphone manufacturer.
It should also be noted that solutions like Opera and Firefox for mobiles have less than one per cent of market share in the sector.
These statistics, sourced from the website StatCounter, were last updated on Sept 2.
On Sept 3, the Google Chrome Twitter account tweeted that a birthday surprise would be coming to celebrate the occasion.