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Edge Overtakes Firefox To Become the Second-Most Popular Browser (softpedia.com) 119

Long-time Slashdot reader AmiMoJo quotes Softpedia: It was probably just a matter of time, but the thing so many people, including everyone at Microsoft, expected finally happened: Microsoft Edge surpassed Mozilla Firefox to become the world's second most-used desktop browser. Data provided by market analysis firm NetMarketShare reveals that the whole thing happened in March, when the adoption of the Chromium-powered Microsoft Edge improved to a level that allowed it to overtake Mozilla's own browser.

So right now, Microsoft Edge is the second most-used desktop browser on the planet with a share of 7.59%, while Mozilla Firefox is now third with 7.19%.

As for who's leading the pack, Google Chrome continues to be number one with a share of 68.50%.

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Edge Overtakes Firefox To Become the Second-Most Popular Browser

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  • Always retarded (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 05, 2020 @12:42PM (#59910776)

    Every time MS releases a new web browser and essentially forces it on everyone through updates, some idiot marketing research firm, website, etc. breathlessly claims it's the most used evaaa! That is has the most installs, etc.

    Retards, all.

    • I just curious, can Edge and internet-exploder work side by side? The only way to get Firefox is to down load it. How one gets Edge is because the users PHB stuffs it down their thoat. Aplogies to Scott Adams
      • by mattb47 ( 85083 )

        The new Chromium-based Edge (aka "Edgium") replaces the old MS-wholly developed version of Edge.

        IE11 still is around on Windows 7, 8, and 10 as well. Microsoft knew that too many business internal sites and such still require it. IE11 is going to remain around for a while.

        So yes, you can use Edgium and IE at the same time.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      Every time MS releases a new web browser and essentially forces it on everyone through updates, some idiot marketing research firm, website, etc. breathlessly claims it's the most used evaaa! That is has the most installs, etc.

      Retards, all.

      Well, those are interesting words. Only Chredge isn't forced on anyone in any way. It doesn't self-install.

      But don't let facts get in the way of your anonymous first-post tirade.

      • Re:Always retarded (Score:5, Insightful)

        by toddestan ( 632714 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @10:15PM (#59911958)

        That's not exactly true. Edge is part of Windows 10, and Windows 10 will update the old Microsoft-built Edge to the new Chredge at some point, if it hasn't happened already. And unless you're an Enterprise customer, you can't turn off updates in Windows 10 short of yanking out the network cable, so you're going to get Chredge one way or another.

        If you still have Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 then you won't get Chredge unless you intentionally download and install it.

    • I know at work, when Edge updates or a Windows update is rolled out, Windows resets your preferred everything to M$ apps on its own without asking.....

      • Caused problems to cousins who want to complete UK Govt. .pdf forms, which after auto-update of Win10 insist on opening in Edge, where they don't work, instead of pre-set Acrobat. Had to tell every cousin to change associations back, which they don't find easy.
    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      If you look at the data this isn't just a monthly blip, it's a long term trend.

  • I remember when FF was king, with 75%+ marketshare.

    Of course that was well before they decided to sacrifice themselves on the alter of social justice. People can be such slow learners.

    • Re:I still use FF (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Rockoon ( 1252108 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @12:55PM (#59910800)
      More like they've made too-many-to-count braindead decisions to be chrome-like, because their primary source of money is Google.
      • More like they've made too-many-to-count braindead decisions to be chrome-like, because their primary source of money is Google.

        You could probably stop after the word "decisions". It was simply amazing how many stupid decisions they've made (and, in some cases, continue to make).

      • They were right... As you now chose Chrome instead. Meaning you would jave liked them to be *more* Chrome like.

        This is why I did stay with Mozilla the whole time.
        Navigator, then Opera and Mozilla ("Seamonkey") to develop for, then Firefox, then Firefox still. No IE, no Chrome (the new IE), no Edge.

        Sorry, I really think if you ever chose IE or Chrome or Edge, you joined the organized crime, supporting those who harmed and harm us all, and should not be a member of our society.

        • Opera was never Mozilla.
        • by gTsiros ( 205624 )

          i still use FF even though it may be slower than chrome. Browsing is bottlenecked by the server anyway... and internet traffic.

          Truth be told, i'd prefer a browser that wasn't a dozen levels of abstraction and 100 MB of executables, but at least it's the only (i think) browser where with some effort you can have near absolute control (videodownloadhelper is one major omission)

          if only the building process was simpler/faster, but i fear each recompilation would take the better part of an hour

        • Sorry, I really think if you ever chose IE or Chrome or Edge, you joined the organized crime, supporting those who harmed and harm us all, and should not be a member of our society.

          And I think if you use Mozilla, then you are rebel scum who should be destroyed! ...The difference being that I am joking, an you are probably not.

          *sigh* crazy people everywhere.

    • Nothing changed; it's still the second most popular browser after Chromedge.
    • by GrahamJ ( 241784 )

      Indeed, but eventually people will learn that privacy actually matters.

      • Indeed, but eventually people will learn that privacy actually matters.

        "Eventually", sure. Of course, by the time that people decide they prefer privacy FF may not be around anyway.

        It's a pity Mozilla aren't faster learners.

    • by NewtonsLaw ( 409638 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @01:21PM (#59910848)

      FF still has 100% marketshare on my computers :-)

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Social justice made Chrome faster and more stable and advertised it on the Google home page?

      Social justice decided to ditch the old plug in system? Social justice made the mobile version have layout issues?

    • by Teun ( 17872 )
      Please explain how is their (perceived) social justice affecting the functioning of the browser?
      Personally I wouldn't even contemplate using Chrome (or anything Microsoft) because they both see you as a source of income.
    • Social justice is a concept of fair and just relations between the individual and society, as measured by the distribution of wealth, opportunities for personal activity, and social privileges. In Western as well as in older Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has often referred to the process of ensuring that individuals fulfill their societal roles and receive what was their due from society.[1][2][3] In the current global grassroots movements for social justice, the emphasis has been on the breaking of barriers for social mobility, the creation of safety nets and economic justice.

      In it's purest, non-biased form, what's so wrong with that?
      How would the opposite of the above be a good thing for civilization in general?
      Disaffected people, people who are being exploited in some way, eventually fight back. That's not good for anyone and creates viscious downward spirals that can wreck a society. I'm reminded of the French Revolution, for instance, as an extreme example.
      Seems to me when you have over 7 billion people alive on the planet at the same time, you should probably arrange for

      • by nbsr ( 2343058 )
        It is simply none of the Mozilla Foundation's business. They should put 100% of their effort into making the best web possible browser as quickly and efficiently as possible. It's now more important than ever - raising money is going to be tough in 2020.

        Each organization has some employees producing disproportional amount of churn and diverting productive ones into endless debates about the process. One such person can easily have a net value of negative 3-5 engineers, so removing them from the organizat
        • They should put 100% of their effort into making the best web possible browser as quickly and efficiently as possible.

          Who gets to decide what is the 'best'? Define what 'best' even means? That's a very vague and arbitrary word. For instance, if you define 'best' as 'largest number of people who have it installed', then Windows 10 is the 'best' operating system for a computer -- but the numbers are artificially inflated by Microsoft because of the methods used to install it on computers. Conversely you could say Linux is the best operating system because (I'm sure) the number of Linux installations on all computing devices

    • Re:I still use FF (Score:4, Informative)

      by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @03:18PM (#59911160) Homepage

      I remember when FF was king, with 75%+ marketshare.

      That's only in your head. Firefox never had more than 30-35% market share ca. 2009-2010. IE lost the top spot ca. 2012 (to Chrome) and second place in 2015 (to Firefox).

    • I remember before that when IE6 that near 100%. ff fought ie/ms for years to bring ie/ms down. leading to another monopoly of google/chrome.

  • No context (Score:5, Interesting)

    by laffer1 ( 701823 ) <luke@@@foolishgames...com> on Sunday April 05, 2020 @12:49PM (#59910788) Homepage Journal

    Without comparing it to previous data, this isn't very useful. Did Mozilla lose market share? Did Google? Where did the users come from?

    At the end of the day, half the browsers on that list are all Chromium based. Google owns the web.

    • It only appears to be true from February 2020 to March 2020 and only on desktop/laptop.
    • Firefox lost a little over the last 2 years, but so did IE+Edge combined. Firefox was about 10.17% 2 years ago, down to 7.19% now. However, IE+Edge had combined 16.75% 2 years ago and have combined 13.46% now. In fact, both Mozilla and MS lost more market share to Chrome in the last 24 months, but there's also a shift to Edge from IE during that time as well.

  • by jfdavis668 ( 1414919 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @12:51PM (#59910792)
    I primarily use Firefox for everyday tasks. If I need to do serious work in a Google tool, I will use Chrome. Edge is my test browser, since I don't use it for anything else. It is a good way to check my work since I don't have it specially configured in any way.
  • by ludux ( 6308946 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @12:55PM (#59910798)
    Not too surprised. Firefox has spent the last decade doing its utmost to do everything in its power to try to be Chrome, in the process ripping out most of its own identity and differentiating features.
  • by QuietLagoon ( 813062 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @01:00PM (#59910810)
    I'm not convinced it was the "improvement" of Edge, as much as it might be the increasing user-base of Windows 10 and Microsoft's heavy-handed promotion (yes, let's call it "promotion") of Edge. That said, hopefully at some point in the near future, Mozilla developers will once again find their compass for Firefox (and Thunderbird) and, among other things, stop changing the plug-in API so frequently.
    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      Also because of Bing rewards. I use Edge on work PC, home PC, and mobile phone. I've got Xbox live paid out 3-years in advance due to earning reward points from searches. That's basically getting paid $50 a year to use their browser.
      • So you are saying you are a really cheap whore.
        No offense. ;)

        • by bn-7bc ( 909819 )
          Well correct me If I’m wrong (never own a console so quite s big chance), but iirc there are allso (games) included with xbox live, so the person you responded ti saved $50 and got the possibility to hav an extended trial of lots if gsmes. Ths vslue to her/him might be way more than $50, so the money saved could guicly run to several hundred. Is that signifficant , well that I can’t answer without knowing more about the posters sercomsrrnces , but name calling (even if no offence is intended) ad
          • I posted it. Xbox live is the Hulu, Netflix, YouTube, etc. device for the living room. So wife and kids get a ton of use from it beyond just games. So its actually $60 bucks saved per year which is cool with me. More than any other browser pays me. ;)
    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Firefox is an excellent browser on desktop. If switch to it immediately if they sorted out the mobile version.

      Having Chrome sync between desktop and mobile keeps me on it. Firefox has sync but until Firefox Mobile gets usabile it doesn't help me because I have to use Chrome on Android.

      • Can't say for Firefox on Android, but I use Firefox on iOS as my main "mobile" browser. It works perfectly fine. As a matter of fact, I am using it to post this comment.
      • by Teun ( 17872 )
        I am and have been using Firefox mobile for years and really wonder what your complaint is?
        But there is one mobile browser I use even more, I believe it is Firefox based, the DuckDuckGo privacy browser.
        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          The main issue is that a lot of pages don't render well. Take this simple page for example: https://www.satsignal.eu/ntp/R... [satsignal.eu]

          It's unreadable because it's so wide on my phone. I have to constantly scroll side to side. There is no way to make the font bigger without zooming, Firefox removed the text size option for some reason.

          • by Teun ( 17872 )
            True, this page is not optimised for mobile screens, it reads a little better when used sideways.

            But Firefox has the "reader" option which makes it just about perfect, something Chrome can't do!
            • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

              True, although you can't enable reader mode for Slashdot desktop mode for some reason. I'll play with it a bit more, perhaps there is some sort of bodge that would make it usable.

              Why can't they just fix it though?

          • I wonder why that is? Maybe Firefox's market share is so small on mobile that developers don't bother testing their sites on it?
            I say this because I don't recall a single site failing to work correctly recently on Firefox on the desktop.
            • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

              Firefox desktop is fine. On mobile the problem is mostly sites that don't have a mobile version. Firefox isn't good at taking a desktop layout and making it work on a mobile screen like Chrome is. If you look at Chrome it makes the page narrower so you can read an entire line at a reasonable zoom level (i.e. reasonable font size), but Firefox doesn't.

              • Thanks. I don't use Chrome on mobile so I didn't know
              • That's not chrome mobile doing anything special aside from not pretending to be a desktop browser. Really it is Firefox mobile's fault if it's not working with the media queries that developers have built into their sites.
                • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

                  You have to keep in mind that phone screens are really high DPI. Mine is about 450 IIRC. Everything has to be scaled up about 5x just to make it viewable.

                  Chrome seems to do that properly and accounts for the width of the page being 5x less than reality too. Firefox doesn't so everything is microscopic. Firefox's "solution" to this is to just zoom in to make the font reach the minimum size, but then you have to scroll over multiple page widths to read a line and it's not even consistent, on some sites it doe

      • }}} Firefox is an excellent browser on desktop. {{{ --- I do not necessarily disagree with that. However, Mozilla also pushes plug-ins to make up for deficiency in features for Firefox. I made the mistake of started to rely upon those plug-ins as part of the Firefox feature-set. With the changes to the plug-in API, the plug-ins I had liked and depended upon no longer work. (similar thing occurred with Thunderbird) So now I'm back to using Firefox in "it's OK" mode, all the while hoping Mozilla will mak
      • Firefox is an excellent browser on desktop. If switch to it immediately if they sorted out the mobile version.

        It's an excellent browser on mobile too. It's not perfect, but it's a lot better than chrome. For one, I can run noscript, which makes the web a much more reasonable place.

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          As much as I love uBlock in Firefox for Android I put up with just DNS66 because Chrome renders pages decently almost every time. With Firefox there are some sites which just don't work (including Slashdot desktop layout!) and some which you need to fiddle around zooming and using the reader mode to make work.

          I really want to switch to Firefox but the constant layout issues are very frustrating.

    • That's definitely a big factor. Windows 7 dropped from ~29% to ~26% of all desktops in the last 3 months, while Windows 10 increased from ~52% to ~57% over the last 4 months. Windows 10 gets Edge by default, whether or not that's the new Chrome-Edge doesn't matter, it's the same metric.

  • by C.D. Reimer ( 6283198 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @01:06PM (#59910824) Homepage
    At my government IT job, we ignore the existence of Edge. If we could remove it from the image, we would. We have IE for legacy applications that don't work well in Chrome, and Chrome for new applications that don't work well in IE.
  • by notdecnet ( 6156534 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @01:13PM (#59910830)
    Every Microsoft Windows box out there comes with Edge built-in by default. So why wouldn't it be second most-used desktop browser. And considreing the core engine has been stolen from Google, it's hardly Microsoft Edge. License [wikipedia.org]: “Proprietary software; a component of Windows 10”. Have these people no shame.
    • by GrahamJ ( 241784 )

      Exactly. It being force-installed and still only having 7something% tells you everything you need to know about user opinion of Edge.

    • by BAReFO0t ( 6240524 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @01:28PM (#59910868)

      It is open source.
      And it came from KDE!
      It is a fork of Blink, which is a fork of WebKit, which is a fork of KHTML.

      Other than that, your point still stands.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      It's a testament to how crap Internet Explorer, MSN and Bing are that even being the default on Windows wasn't enough to make them succeed.

    • This is stupid, the one browser that does not come preinstalled on anything is the one that beats all others. If what you say had any bearing on the truth, Edge would have 99% of the market, not practically nothing.

  • Yeah, like we didn't see this game before.

    No, mate ... MS pushing it onto all people via Windows does not make it popular. Only used. Unknowingly, unwillingly, or in confusion.

    We have seen this before.
    And it is YOU ... *making* it "popular"... with this very article.

    Because you are going to keep saying it, until you or people believe it... and follow it ... and you fulfilled your own prophecy.

    Or ... until we stop you. By not being fools.

    So you are the enemy.
    You are the PR lobbyist. The viral marketer. The s

  • Other than making developers customize their web apps to make them "work better".

    The most popular restaurant is McDonalds. Does that make it the best one?

    Now Edge, which is really just chrome in shiny wolfs clothing and is installed on every windows 10 system by default, has moved up to #2 (aka Starbucks)

    I'm sure not everybody remembers when IE was the most popular browser, (back in 2008 or so)

    Here's a month by month breakdown of browser stats starting in around 2002:

    https://www.w3schools.com/brow... [w3schools.com]

  • I'll bet Firefox still wins in the number up updates it does though
  • by Jerry ( 6400 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @01:59PM (#59910934)
    I do not trust NetMarketShare to give honest results on the popularity of any software or OS. Actually, FireFox is at 50% and Edge+Explorer is at 2%, using the same justification as NMS. https://distrowatch.com/awstat... [distrowatch.com]
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      That is of course true. The tracking methods used do not work with FireFox users since the vast majority of them have JavaScript and Spying and Tracking disabled. Something which cannot be done with Edge, Chrome, or EdgeChrome/ChromeEdge.

      None of my 7 billion computers are tracked by the hooligans, for example, because my Firefox disables the ability of these hooligans to track.

  • by ytene ( 4376651 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @02:12PM (#59910974)
    ... is to point out that Windows 10 has been available now for nearly five years (it will be 5 years on July 29th), AND it is delivered by default on every new Windows PC solid... and yet it is only now, after 5 years, catching up to Firefox...

    When you put it that way, you realize how utterly rubbish the take-up of Edge has been...

    It's a bit like a runner finishing a marathon by *just* beating another competitor and then crowing about it... when the other runners finished the race and went home the day before.

    Long live Firefox, thanks. For it's flaws - no shortage of 'em - it's still *not Google* and *not Microsoft* and *cross Platform*. Win.Win.Win.
    • I know reading comprehension sucks around here, but you did notice that the summary said "Chromium Version of Edge" - which isn't shipped with Windows 10 and isn't installed by an update at this point in time. It got wherever it is because users sought it out and self installed it.
    • Long live Firefox, thanks. For it's flaws - no shortage of 'em - it's still *not Google* and *not Microsoft* and *cross Platform*. Win.Win.Win.

      Well said. And consider it stolen. ;-)

  • by Solandri ( 704621 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @02:15PM (#59910984)
    NetMarketShare [wikipedia.org] is the smallest of the three big web traffic monitoring companies. They monitor only about 40,000 sites. Furthermore, they count in terms of visitors per month. So when you ask your grandma to fire up a browser once a month to go to logmein.com so you can fix her computer remotely, she counts just as much in NetMarketShare's eyes as you do even though you browse the web 12 hours a day.

    The biggest traffic monitoring company is StatCounter. They monitor 3 million sites. Nearly 100x more than NetMarketShare. And they count raw numbers of page views. Their stats [statcounter.com] show Firefox at 4.4% (behind Safari at 18.35%), and Edge (have to edit it to show individual Chrome-type browsers) at 4.14%. Suggesting that NetMarketShare's stats for Edge are being inflated by the "grandma" scenario I gave above - people who only use a browser a few times a month, and thus end up using Edge since it came pre-loaded.

    The other traffic monitoring company is W3Counter, which tracks 80,000 sites but only the last 15,000 pageviews per site (so sites which get more pageviews are not disproportionately represented). I'm not quite sure what to make of their stats [w3counter.com]. They show FF in 4th behind Safari and IE+Edge, but neither Edge nor FF show up in their individual browser version breakdown.
    • Furthermore, they [NetMarketShare] count in terms of visitors per month.

      Ack. They count in terms of unique visitors per month.

    • I am partial to the Wikipedia browser stats [wikimedia.org], although it looks like it was upgraded recently (in the last few years since I looked) and now the data only goes back to 2015 - although you can also look at their older data [wikimedia.org].

      It tells a pretty different story about Edge - it has Edge at 2.1% with Firefox at 5%.

      The growth of Edge is totally uninteresting to me but the fall of Firefox makes me pretty sad. Firefox down from almost 10% at the start of the recorded period.

    • hey count raw numbers of page views

      Which is what makes their statistics completely worthless. Just because I use an extension to refresh a webpage every 15 seconds and I run this 18 hours a day, does not mean I should count as 100,000 visitors. We are trying to look at the market distribution of web browsers, not the distribution of data.

      W3Counter is even worse.

      As NetMarketShare is the only company that monitors unique visitors, it is the only source for information on browser distribution.

  • Serious question; don't they respect your privacy less than Firefox does?
  • by another_boomer ( 6369934 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @02:46PM (#59911080)
    NetMarketShare, StatCounter, and the rest use Javascript embedded in self-selected websites to send data directly to their servers.
    The data is biased towards those that would visit those particular sites and to those that would not run script blockers and/or tracking blockers. It is likely that they have never recorded my use of Firefox.
    It is probable that more Firefox users will run blockers than Edge users would. It is possible that Edge users may be more interested in visiting the tracking sites than Firefox users do.
  • It's the easiest way to download Firefox or Chrome onto a Window$ machine with a fresh Windows 10 install!

  • Since most people use phones/tablets to browse today, Microsofts 7% share of -desktop- market is meaningless
  • by JasterBobaMereel ( 1102861 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @03:13PM (#59911146)

    The symbol for the Internet and total customer locking is still a thing ...

  • 2 flavors of Chrome. I've been trying to force myself to use Firefox more because having one company be in charge of most of browsing especially when it's a company like Microsoft or Google.
  • Is there any evidence people are making a conscious choice or is it magically appearing in windows updates whether you asked for it or not?

    • The only way to get Edgium is to disable security on your computer (though apparently many who went and got Edgium never bothered to enable any security in the first place) and go get it from the Microsoft Malware Repository (they call it the Microsoft Store).

      Eventually Edgium may be distributed with Windows or chucked into a so-called "feature update". However, not even Microsoft believes that Edgium is stable enough for that yet, and it might be many many many many many years before it is.

  • by t4eXanadu ( 143668 ) on Sunday April 05, 2020 @06:15PM (#59911502)

    It comes bundled with Windows. The vast majority of people will just use that, because it's there and they don't have to do anything like downloading and installing an application.

    I'm more surprised that Chrome became as dominant as it did, but then again when most people use Google, and Google relentlessly advertises for their browser, it's a given. People are lazy.

  • I'll bet that if it didn't come pre-installed fewer people would use it.

  • "Edge Overtakes Firefox To Become the Second-Most Popular Browser"

    Proving once again that nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of Americans.

  • Still no to Google Chrome and Edge ! I use Safari and Firefox !
  • Most people don't choose, they just use the browser on the desktop. Then there's the annoyingly complicated route to switch your default browser in Wndoze OS. For those that do choose, Firefox is the go-to option. I will never understand why people knowingly choose Chrome over Firefox.
  • Everytime I try to use it I run into problems. From a time card to other web sites it's broken. I'd like to ditch IE and just use edge. It's a long way from that happening.

  • I'm wondering if the report uses data from how many browsers are actually "running" (as Microsoft has Edge do) vs. how much use they're actually getting in the real world.

    For example, I use CCleaner and when cleaning browser cache, nearly every time it asks, 'Edge is running in the background, do you want to close it?' even if it was never opened in the first place. Nobody I know uses Edge, it has always seemed to me like Windows launches Edge intentionally in the bg to inflate numbers and therefore make sh

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