Net-Metrix: Browser landscape becomes increasingly mobile

Comparing the browser shares of January 2012 and January 2011, the growth of Android and the decline of the protagonists Internet Explorer and Firefox are particularly striking: 3.5 percent of website visits are now made via an Android device (previous year: 1 percent), which corresponds to more than a threefold increase. In contrast, the shares of visits via Internet Explorer (43.9 percent; -7.8 percentage points) and Firefox (19.1 percent; -4.2 percentage points) continue their downward trend. The shares of visits via iApps (9.8 percent) and Mobile Safari (5.6 percent) both doubled compared with January 2011; thus, both mobile browsing via apps and via the iPhone, iPad and iPhone browser continue to grow. Google Chrome is the only stationary browser to show an increase (from 4 to 6.5 percent). At a total of 2.3% (previous year: 3.4%), the share of all other browsers from Opera, Black Berry, Nokia, Samsung and others is unspectacularly low. There is no growth candidate in sight here.

Graph I: Browser distribution in January 2012 and 2011 in comparison

The trend towards a significantly higher share of mobile systems is also evident in the operating systems: The share of class leader Windows dropped from 77.6 to 66.1 percent, which is still clearly enough for the top spot. While Apple's Mac OS remains virtually unchanged at 12 percent, it is clearly outstripped by its own mobile counterpart iOS with 15.7 percent (previous year: 7.9 percent). Thus, in contrast to 2011, more Internet visits were made via iPhone, iPad and iPod overall in January 2012 than via all Mac OS devices. Among the operating systems, Android's share is also growing the most, namely in line with browsing from 1 to 3.5 percent. The surprise guest among the expanders is certainly Linux: With growth from 0.7 to 1.4 percent, the number of visits doubled year-on-year.

Chart II: Operating system distribution in January 2012 and 2011 in comparison