14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft is betting big on Windows 10 adoption, and the company hopes that as more people move to the operating system, its new browser is also gaining ground and becomes a better rival to the likes of Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox.
While adoption figures for the new Microsoft Edge browser are on the rise, data provided by analytics.usa.gov and concerning browsers that US residents are using to access government websites shows that the new Windows 10 app is still trailing behind its rivals and Internet Explorer.
In fact, the transition off Internet Explorer seems to advance quite slowly, despite the fact that Microsoft no longer improves the browser, but only releases security patches.
Google Chrome, the dominant browser in the US
It’s no surprise that Google Chrome is the leading choice for users around the world, and these new statistics show that Google’s app is the top choice for browsing government websites too. No less than 43.1 percent of them are using Chrome on .gov pages in the US while 22.8 percent stick with Safari. Internet Explorer is next with 19.1 percent, followed by Firefox with 8.3 percent.
In case you’re wondering how come Safari is used by so many people, it’s because the data includes figures from both desktops and mobile devices, and with iPhones quite popular in the US, it’s no surprise that many stick with the default browser to load government websites.
61.5 percent of the users accessed these pages from a desktop, and 32.2 percent of them did it on a mobile device. 6.3 percent of them were using a tablet.
Microsoft Edge is currently at 2.6 percent, but this was kind of expected, given that the browser is only available in Windows 10. Edge browser is not offered on any other Windows version except 10, and Microsoft has no plans to change that since it promotes Edge as one of the reasons users should upgrade to the new OS.