March 23, 2012 9:26am by David Farrar

Chrome takes the lead

Google’s Chrome web browser overtook Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) to become market leader globally for the first time last Sunday, web analytics firm StatCounter said on Wednesday.

“While it is only one day, this is a milestone,” said Aodhan Cullen, StatCounter’s chief executive.

“At weekends, when people are free to choose what browser to use, many of them are selecting Chrome in preference to IE.”

On March 18, Chrome was used for 32.7 per cent of all browsing, while Explorer had 32.5 per cent share. When people returned to their offices on Monday, the IE share rose to 35 per cent and Chrome’s share slipped to 30 per cent.

“Whether Chrome can take the lead in the browser wars in the long term remains to be seen, however the trend towards Chrome usage at weekends is undeniable,” Cullen said.

On a monthly basis, Chrome’s market share has surged to 31 per cent so far in March from 17 per cent a year ago, while Explorer has slipped to 35 per cent from 45 per cent a year earlier.

Heh I remember when Netscape Navigator was the market leader. But IE soon overtook it after being launched (mainly because new Windows PCs would come with it already on) and not even Firefox even overtook it.

I migrated a few months ago from Firefox to Chrome, and am loving it. Didn’t think I would like having the browser bar also being the search engine, but you know it works great. Features such as pre-load results make quite a speed difference also.