May 3, 2011

When I design my websites, I always make sure that they render properly across all web browsers including; Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, Google Chrome and Opera. This is an absolute necessity because my sites get visitors from all of these browsers (some more than others) each and every month. Here is a list of the most popular browsers used on my sites for the month of April (along with some pretty pie charts).

Overall – April 2011
37.08% – Internet Explorer
25.40% – Firefox
14.31% – Chrome
13.90% – Safari
3.57% – Opera
5.74% – Other

Internet Explorer Version- April 2011
73.81% – 8.0
14.50% – 9.0
6.96% – 7.0
4.71% – 6.0
0.01% – 5.5

Firefox Version- April 2011
48.18% – 3.6.16
22.07% – 4.0
4.83% – 3.6.13
3.65% – 3.5.18
21.27% – Other

Chrome Version- April 2011
56.93% – 10.0.648.204
25.16% – 10.0.648.205
7.20% – Other
4.55% – 11.0.696.60
1.54% – 11.0.696.57

There are a lot of things these type of stats tell us about internet users and the browsers they choose. It’s clear that people who use Google Chrome or Firefox update to the latest version much more quickly than others (mainly because it’s an automatic update). We can also see that most Internet Explorer users only update to the latest version once it’s included in a Microsoft update. The most used browser on my sites is still Internet Explorer however, Firefox is a very close second with Chrome and Safari battling for third.

As far as web design goes, it’s clear that every site created needs to be optimized for every browser out there. It may be frustrating and it may be tedious, but if you want to be taken seriously as a web designer, it’s something that needs to be done.