One In Six Uses Firefox

Mozilla Corp.'s Firefox browser has gained more than a percentage point in global market share since May, a Dutch Web analytics firm said Monday, while Microsoft's Internet Explorer dropped under the 80 percent mark in the U.S. for the first time since it took on Netscape.

Amsterdam-based OneStat reported that Firefox now accounts for 12.9 percent of browsers used worldwide, and 15.8 percent of those used in the U.S. Microsoft's IE, meanwhile, fell to 83.1 percent globally and 79.8 percent in the U.S.

"It seems that the global usage share of Mozilla Firefox started to grow rapidly again after a period of no growth" said Niels Brinkman, co-founder of OneStat, in a statement. As Firefox gained 1.1 percent since May, IE lost 2.1 percent of its share in the same period. Other browsers, notably Opera -- which reached the 1 percent mark -- and Safari, which accounts for 3.3 percent of the U.S. browser market, picked up the slack.

Of the countries for which data was available, Firefox held its biggest share in Germany (39 percent) while Internet Explorer did its best in the U.K. (86.2 percent). Opera owns 4.6 percent of the market share in Australia.

Opera unveiled its v. 9.0 edition last month, while Mozilla and Microsoft are slated to launch their respective Firefox 2.0 and Internet Explorer 7 in final form before the end of 2006.