Last month, we saw share of both Internet Explorer 8 and 9 grow, and we’re pleased to see that momentum continue in February with the availability of the IE9 Release Candidate. Since its release on February 10th, the IE9 RC has already been downloaded over 11 million times. Together with the IE9 Beta, IE9 has been downloaded over 36 million times since its initial availability on September 15, 2010. As of February, IE9 has now surpassed total combined downloads of IE8 Beta and IE8 RC, and Net Applications reports that IE9 now represents 0.66% of all worldwide browser usage share on Windows with 2.09% usage share on Windows 7.
Net Applications also reported this month that Internet Explorer share increased by 0.86% across Windows. Across all operating systems, IE share also grew 0.78%. In some part, this is due to the geographic weighting change according to Net Applications. However, when adjusted using the older weighting, IE8 and 9 actually show even stronger growth on Windows: up 1.31% (versus 1.13% using the new February weighting) – or over three times Chrome’s 0.42% growth. We continue to measure our share progress relative to our addressable base, and in this case our addressable base is Windows.
As always, we are excited by the warm reception IE9 has received through the Beta and RC stages, and we look forward to the full product release in the near future.
Thanks,
Roger Capriotti
Director, Internet Explorer Product Marketing
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