IE Down, Edge Up... Global Browser Usage Stats Are for Cocktail Parties and Conference Slides

Hartley Charlton's article, "Microsoft Edge Looks Set to Overtake Safari as World's Second Most Popular Desktop Browser," highlights the intense competition in the browser market. The shifting market share among major players—like a surprising upset in an Olympic race—makes for compelling news.

Microsoft Edge's desktop market share now sits at 9.54 percent globally, just 0.3 percent behind Apple's Safari (9.84 percent). Google Chrome remains the dominant player with 65.38 percent. Mozilla Firefox holds fourth place at 9.18 percent.

Safari's market share, which stood at 10.38 percent in January 2021, has been gradually declining. This trend suggests a potential future drop to third or fourth place.

However, regional data paints a different picture. Edge has already surpassed Safari in Europe, while a 5% gap remains in North America.

The relevance of these global statistics to individual developers or website owners is minimal. Focusing on broad global usage figures for support decisions is misguided. Instead, prioritize website analytics—data from actual user visits—to inform your choices. This is the only data that truly matters.

Alan Dávalos's "The baseline for web development in 2022" similarly uses global browser statistics to suggest support decisions.

IE's global market share is below 0.5 percent. Even in Japan, where IE usage is higher, it's nearing 2 percent and declining.

The rationale for continued IE support based solely on market share is now obsolete.

Relying on global statistics for support decisions is illogical. Even major companies like Google (in their "dropping" of IE 11 support) and WordPress (with its vast market share) base their decisions on their own internal data and usage analytics.

For new products, gathering your own analytic data quickly allows for future-proof support choices based on actual user behavior.

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