US govt data shows that Chrome is the top browser

Mar 29, 2015 00:26 GMT  ·  By

Third-party market analysis firms show that Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, and Mozilla Firefox are the three leading browsers right now, but data provided by the United States government claims otherwise.

Instead of Firefox, which usually comes after Chrome and Internet Explorer, the US government says that the third position goes to Apple's very own Safari, which is available on both Mac OS X and iOS.

These figures might take some people by surprise, given the fact that Firefox is most of the time considered a pretty powerful browser, but it's pretty clear that its usage varies by market, and in the United States, more people prefer to stick to Safari.

Chrome and IE leading the pack

Specifically, Google's Chrome is said to be the leading browser among Americans who browse government websites with a share of 34.8 percent. Internet Explorer is very close behind with 28.4 percent, with version 11 said to be the most popular, as it's installed on 14.8 percent of these systems.

Internet Explorer 11 is the default browser in Windows 8.1, Windows 7 (with all updates installed) and Windows 10, so it's no surprise that so many people use it.

Safari is third in these statistics with an impressive 20.1 percent market share, while Firefox comes next with 11 percent.

Needless to say, Mozilla's score is somewhat disappointing for Firefox fans, but it's no surprise that Safari is doing so well right now. The United States is one of Apple's key markets and both Mac OS X and iOS are pretty popular among Americans, and since Safari is the default browser on both, it's easy to see how its market share increased so fast.

There's also a bad side to these stats. 1.8 percent of the Americans still use Internet Explorer 7 to browse government websites, while some 0.1 percent rely on Internet Explorer 6 to do the same. If you're wondering, Internet Explorer launched 14 years ago with Windows XP, which is no longer supported by Microsoft.

Google Chrome is the top browser, the US govt says
Google Chrome is the top browser, the US govt says

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Firefox appears to be losing ground in the browser war
Google Chrome is the top browser, the US govt says
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