Firefox dropped below the 10% share value on Netmarketshare

[ADN]

Netmarketshare's browser market share has just been updated to include May 2018 share information. The company recorded a drop below the 10% mark in the desktop and laptop devices market for the Mozilla Firefox browser.

 

Firefox had a market share of 12.63% in June 2017 according to Netmarketshare and even managed to rise above the 13% mark in 2017 before its share fell to 9.92% in May 2018.

 

Google Chrome, Firefox's biggest rival in the browser world, managed to increase its massive lead from 60.08% in June 2017 to 62.85% in May 2018.

 

Microsoft's Internet Explorer dropped a percent point to 11.82% in May 2018 and Microsoft's Edge browser gained less than 0.50% to 4.26% over the year.

 

 

Netmarketshare recorded a downwards trend for the Firefox browser in the past 12 months and while that may sound alarming on first glance, it may not be as bad as the numbers indicate.

 

Netmarketshare collects usage stats and does not get "real" numbers from companies like Mozilla, Google or Microsoft. The company monitors the use of browsers on a subset of Internet sites and creates the market share reports using the data it collects.

 

While that is certainly good enough for trends if the number of monitored user interactions is high enough, it is not completely accurate and real-world values can be different based on a number of factors. While it is unlikely that they differ a lot, it is certainly possible that the share is different to the one reported by the company.

 

Mozilla launched Firefox 57 Quantum in 2017 as an effort to revitalize Firefox by dropping support for legacy systems such as the classic add-on system in favor of the new standard WebExtensions, and integrated new features such as support for multiple processes, and faster components in the browser.

 

Mozilla has yet to reveal how successful the change was for the organization in terms of users. How many users did switch from Firefox to another browser, and how many switched to Firefox because of the new browser?

 

Netmarketshare's statistics indicate that Firefox lost more users than it gained but we don't know for sure unless Mozilla reveals before and after numbers to the public.

 

Firefox is still the third largest desktop browser right after Chrome and Internet Explorer. Actually, only Chrome and Internet Explorer have a market share above 10% according to Netmarketshare's latest figures while all other browsers are below the mark.

The end of Firefox?

Even if Firefox lost users it is not the end of the browser. Opera, Vivaldi and other browser companies show that it is possible to develop browsers with a lower market share and the same can be true for Mozilla. The organization may need some restructuring in the coming years to take this and -- probably -- falling revenue from search engine inclusion deals into account but Firefox won't just go away because it is dropping.

 

Ghacks.net

[Bizarre™]

This wouldn't have happened if they didn't drop the support for classic extensions. Their gimmick about Quantum Firefox didn't work out well.

[vissha]

1 hour ago, Bizarre™ said:

This wouldn't have happened if they didn't drop the support for classic extensions. Their gimmick about Quantum Firefox didn't work out well.

Yes, additionally they started removing more good features starting Firefox 60.
The best would be Firefox sold/donated to Cyberfox since it supports x86 & x64. If not possible, Waterfox / Palemoon.
However, that's mostly not possible.

Mozilla should downgrade the current development team and call top ex-developers, ex-contributors to restore Firefox to its best form and all moved users shall come back.

[galaxyquestor]

Their arrogance, demonstrated on their user forums, has been utterly breathtaking. They simply blow off older users who HATE that extensions that were superbly well-engineered and useful are gone, and essentially tell them "it is what it is - get used to it." There is, in fact, nothing "Quantum Fireball fast"  in terms of measurable speed in Quantum with the older Firefox, (in actual usage) even when using quite a few extensions - at least not enough speed to make up for the loss of the best extensions ever written by a legion of very dedicated, decades-long extension developers. Only my opinion, of course, and others (especially Firefox developers) will disagree, but I have switched to Chrome after trying to downgrade Firefox - only to find that their extension developers were fading like a flashbulb after-image. Very sad. Instead of simply acknowledging it was a mistake, they blithely, arrogantly carried forward until their extension developers moved on. There is no "calling them back." Nor, after the way they have treated Firefox users after this complete fiasco, will there be any "calling back" what WAS a legion of dedicated user-fans. 

They, like many of Firefox's users, HAVE 'moved on,' after receiving the 'bum's rush' by Mozilla. They will sink like a stone before they admit they were wrong, and are an example of many companies who simply refuse to listen - even to a multitude of users, who are telling them about why they now hate its lack of extensions (or whatever was changed, depending on the program). The fall is well deserved, and should be an example to other developers who simply say "We know what's best for you - time marches on, and you'll get used to it." In other words, shut your pie-hole and do what we tell you to do. They have acted like the worst kind of Corporate idiots, as though they had a monopoly on the browser market - which is REALLY stupid. 

I will miss neither the browser (I do miss the older version, and feel there was a way to work with the ext. devs and make more incremental changes - and to warn Firefox users who were used to simply upgrading Firefox as a matter of course, because they trusted them not to break everything useful about the browser to them), nor the company who treated so many users who TOLD them they did NOT like the change - at all - with such utter contempt. ANY company who ceases to listen to its end-users, and in fact answers their objections with cold, superior, and arrogant answers, deserves whatever happens to them. And this will be an ugly and unnecessary crash and burn.

[pc71520]

Running Quantum x64...

[BioHazard]

I gave up on Firefox years ago. 

[orbystorm]

Perhaps use firefox esr..

[Bizarre™]

I personally use WaterFox, but sometimes I use IE because the classic extensions I have installed occasionally get hiccups.

[DKT27]

As I had said before, a lot of Chrome lovers are switching to Firefox - a lot of them are expert coders and programmers and such. But even more than that the Firefox lovers are switching elsewhere.

 

As for making decisions, let me remind you guys almost all the people who founded Mozilla have left the company, most of them for personal reasons by now. So do not expect them to follow what the founders wanted. They however still are trying to keep some of the values.

 

The good thing I can tell however is that Mozilla is working on APIs from some time now. These APIs are going to give addon developers more power when making those addons, which means we are going to see better addons than what we are seeing right now. The problem is that it's happening really slowly, they need to someone speed it up there.

[sandman117]

I gave up on Firefox when they disabled extensions, also had a other issues with Quantum, can't remember the exact details, just couldn't be bothered any more I've other things to do with my time. Switched to Chrome despite privacy - data gathering concerns, I just need something that works. I'd give Firefox another go if they sort it out but it would need good reviews by independent sources first so I don't waste my time.

[Rekkio]

I gave up on Firefox after they started their extension signing enforcement and banned the best privacy addons (if you're into privacy stuff, you surely have noticed this: addons that are too efficient are removed from the store).

 

They ruined it, but the Waterfox dev is doing a great job sanitizing it. I moved to Waterfox and never looked back.

 

With Waterfox you can make the most aggressive browser configs if you want, and use as many banned addons as you wish.

 

No matter weither Firefox becomes great again or not, I'm never using the offical Firefox build ever again.

 

 

[BimBamSmash]

So am I to understand that the percentage drop from Firefox user base got added to Chrome's? And are people really jumping ship because of the Firefox extension overhaul? Seems rather strange. I don't see any of those lost features in Chrome to incentivize this. Chrome doesn't even give access to its core settings like Firefox does, and don't get me started on big G and its privacy policy.

 

But really, what is the motivation factor here? My guess are (1) "word of mouth" and (2) the fact that Android rules supreme in the mobile market right now and the platform comes with Chrome pre-installed.

But I'd love to be corrected on this if it is anything else.

 

Personally I have been on Firefox since version 3.0, around the same time I got introduced to NoScript. Since then I can't imagine browsing the web without my carefully configured NoScript sitting just below the option menu. Since it is only available on Firefox for now I cannot imagine using another browser.