Chrome tops list for over half of web users

Google's Chrome browser had a strong 2016 — it went from being only the second most popular web browser to capturing more than half of the market, according to NetApplications.

Data from the web analytics company's NetMarketShare service shows that Chrome's share of the total browser market increased from 35.05% in January to 56.43% by December. Chrome overtook Microsoft's Internet Explorer in April to become the world's most used browser.

Internet Explorer's share meanwhile declined throughout the year, falling from 43.82% in January to just 20.84% in December, due in part to the fact that Internet Explorer has been replaced by Microsoft's Edge as the default browser for Windows 10.

But this still put Internet Explorer's usage share at more than eight percentage points higher than third-ranked Firefox, which had a mixed 2016 but ended the year with only a slight increase in its market share from January — from 11.42% to 12.22%.

Apple's Safari meanwhile saw its market share decrease from 3.64% to 3.47%, as the browser was overtaken by Edge for fourth position. Edge saw a slow but relatively steady increase in its market share from 3.07% to 5.33%.

Throughout the year, usage also continued to consolidate between the above five browsers. The usage share of browsers in the ‘Other’ category — such as Opera — declined from 2% in January to 1.7% in December.

Image courtesy of TopRank Marketing under CC