- Image via CrunchBase
The beta version of Microsoft’s latest Web browser, Internet Explorer 9, has been launched. The new browser has been tipped to take advantage of Windows 7’s high graphic capabilities that will enable it to perform more like smart-phone applications. In addition, by using both the computer’s processor and graphics card, IE9 comes with up-to-date multi-media capabilities to improve the average user’s Web experience with more interactive functionalities.
Microsoft hopes that the new browser, which also uses HTML5, will be more competitive and increase the dwindling dominance of Internet Explorer by Web users especially since the European Commission insisted that the organisation must offer all Windows OS users the freedom to choose a browser of their choice.
It should be noted that since 2003, the organisation has seen a 97% lead in market share reduce around to 60% with Google Chrome, which was launched in December 2008, already commanding over 7.5% of the Web browser market. Other notable competitors include Mozilla Firefox which holds close to 25% of the market share. No date has been set yet for the full release of the IE9 browser.
Current Browser Market Share (according to Net Applications)
- Microsoft Internet Explorer – 60.40%
- Mozilla Firefox – 22.93%
- Google Chrome – 7.52%
- Safari – 5.16%
- Opera – 2.37%
- Opera Mini – 0.88%
- Others – 0.71%
Talking Point
Can Internet Explorer 9 see off competition from other Web browsers such as Chrome and Firefox?
3 Comments
Leave a Reply
Leave a Reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
Pingback: Tweets that mention Microsoft Launch Internet Explorer 9
Henway
September 17, 2010 at 5:00 pm
I personally would like to see some consolidation of the browser market.. I think this is 1 area where competition would not be good.. there’s only so much innovation you can make with the browser… Having 1 popular browser that 99% of ppl use would be relieve much of the pain web designer and developers face day-to-day.
European Internet Marketing
September 27, 2010 at 3:21 pm
Internet Explorer will always have a large user base due to it being the Microsoft browser (even with the EU ruling in place) though my experience has always been that, once a user stops using IE and switches to Chrome or Firefox, they don’t ever go back to IE.
I also notice a lot of people switching from Firefox to Chrome lately. Firefox is just so damn clunky and bloated these days it’s more like a Fire Rhinoceros, whereas Chrome is much quicker and lighter.
@Henway: “Having 1 popular browser that 99% of ppl use” – actually that was the whole problem; the old, “now do I design this to work in Internet Explorer or do I write the code the way it’s supposed to be written?” dilemma.
Later iterations have gotten better, I have to say, though personally the only thing about this announcement that’s worth getting excited about is that there’s yet another version, three numbers now, between the current IE browser and IE6.
And that means the designers and developers of the world can finally flush all those IE5/6-related CSS hacks down the john. o/