Chrome is particularly popular during the weekends

Mar 21, 2012 15:01 GMT  ·  By

Google Chrome has been constantly growing in popularity around the world. Google's browser has been gaining up on Firefox, even overtaking it depending on who you ask, and catching up to Internet Explorer as well.

Still, it was firmly in second or third place, with IE having a big lead. But for one day, this weekend, Chrome overtook IE to become the most popular browser in the world, according to data by StatCounter.

Pushed up by particularly strong positions in Russia, Brazil and India, some of the fastest growing internet markets, Chrome became the most used browser on March 18, the first time this has happened.

IE regained its lead on Monday, but you can bet that Chrome will once again overtake IE this weekend and the weekend after that.

Looking at StatCounter's data, you can see a very specific usage trend, most people abandon IE over the weekend. That's easily explained, IE is used at work in many places and users don't have the option of replacing it.

As soon as they get home though, they hop on Chrome and not IE. Of course, market share stats can be misleading. With no reference point regarding usage, there's no way of knowing whether people use Chrome more in the weekend or whether they just stop using IE and any other browser.

The fact that Firefox doesn't see much gain or loss over the weekend indicates that people do tend to prefer Chrome to IE. Still, keep in mind that internet usage generally drops over the weekend.

"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. At weekends, when people are free to choose what browser to use, many of them are selecting Chrome in preference to IE," explained Aodhan Cullen, CEO of StatCounter.