“Until about five years ago, techies and others who wanted a speedier, extensible, more privacy-oriented web browser on their desktops often immediately downloaded Mozilla’s Firefox to use instead of Internet Explorer on Windows or Safari on the Mac,” Walt Mossberg writes for The Verge.
“But those days seem long ago,” Mossberg writes. “Firefox is hardly discussed today, and its usage has cratered from a high of over 30 percent of the desktop browser market in 2010 to about 12 percent today, according to Mozilla, citing stats from NetMarketShare. (Various other analytics firms put the share as low as 10 percent or as high as 15 percent.) And Firefox’s share on mobile devices is even worse, at under 1 percent, according to the same firm.”
“After years of neglecting Firefox, misreading mobile users, and putting most of its chips on a failed phone project,” Mossberg writes, “Mozilla says it is working hard to get Firefox off the mat.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The more the merrier. In browsers, especially, competition is good.
SEE ALSO:
Why is Apple’s Safari browser such a memory hog? – December 9, 2016
Internet Exploder: Beleaguered Microsoft continues to hemorrhage browser share at record rates – July 6, 2016
Ars Technica: Even at 1.0, Vivaldi closes in on the cure for the common browser – April 28, 2016
Apple’s Safari is the world’s second most popular web browser – April 13, 2016
Yeah especially since Chrome is a non-starter by virtue of the data-thieving company who owns it.
The guy that started Firefox, Brendan Eich, was unceremoniously dumped from the company for engaging in personal, political activities that weren’t sanctioned by minitrue. So, he left and started the ‘Brave’ browser. See the following:
http://m.slashdot.org/story/305575
https://www.brave.com/
Pretty nice browser, too.
Just tried Brave. So far, it seems faster than Vivaldi. Definitely faster than Safari/Safari Tech Preview, Firefox, and Chrome. Again, these are just my observations. NO official testing were completed.
Got news for you bloke, Most people use chrome now. More than Safari. More than IE, more than Firefox. The first thing people ask for (new hires, young and bright) is Chrome.
I’ll pass, bloke. And if everyone was jumping off a cliff would you do that too? Because effectively using Google data-mined crap is doing exactly that.
I don’t have to use Chrome so… I… don’t.
I don’t think many people use Chrome for the reason it is a power hog.
I still use Firefox on my Mac (and my Windows machines).
Works fine for me. Don’t like Safari or Chrome and Firefox does everything I need it to.
Safari has bee good for me, but I used to have every browser made! From iCab, Camino, OmniWeb, I had them all. Now, it’s just Safari and Olera on my Mac, Safari and Mercury on iPad. What I need is a great email program for Mac and iOS.
Yes. Where is that great email program for the Mac? And why hadn’t Apple “figured it out” and done it right to show everyone else the way an email program should behave?
BTW, that was a rhetorical question…
Yeah, I know JW, I didn’t want to take time to write so much about my email needs, I like Mail okay, but I do need one more good Mac OS and iOS email program. It’s just a special need for one organ I work with.
Yep. Still prefer Firefox for various reasons. If they make it even better, I surely welcome that.
WHAT!? How is it possible that Firefox is somehow ‘forgotten”?
Version 3.6 was out in Jan 2010. In Jan 2017 Version 51. Thats 46 full number versions in only 84 months. Do the Math, thats a brand spankin new full number version release every 1.83 months!!! Firefox rocks the version number war when compared to any other of the browser sloths.
[/sarcasm]
Ah, glad someone else beat me to it. It’s 11. Because 11 is better than 10. Can’t wait until Firefox hit version 666.
Number version games aside, it’s obvious to everyone but Uncle Walt that Firefox is getting constant development and can stand up with any other browser out there.
I feel sorry for people who haven’t given Firefox a serious test drive. It’s so customizable, how can you not make it work perfectly for your unique needs?
It got crushed by Chrome. It sure didn’t get crushed by Safari.
I rarely use Chrome. It’s fast, but I don’t like their approach to Preferences, and because every page I visit probably is logged by Google.
Firefox is always faster than Safari on my 2012 MBP, though, very snappy. If Safari went away, it would easy to use Firefox. Their frequent upgrades that load automatically appeal, also.
But it’s been Safari for the last two or three years. It does everything i need, and Reader View is almost indispensable.
I’ve recently started to migrate towards Firefox and away from Safari, somewhat begrudgingly. Safari has been seriously problematic for me of late and I don’t know quite why. If fixed, I’d prefer to stay with Safari. Opening many pages at once (a bookmark option) caused the last bunch of pages to fail, seemingly a memory-related error of some kind. Also, I can’t get almost any video to play. E.g., youtube from the various Apple-centric news sites. I have no idea why it happens or how to fix…so I’m increasingly starting to rely on Firefox instead. Will never allow Chrome near my devices.
Using Firefox now. It’s still the best overall. Plugins and customization are second to none. Speed is comparable to anyone else in real world use — faster than anything if you block the most egregious ads and trackers.
Firefox is my #2 browser. Maybe Walt forgot it because he forgets a lot of things these days…
Opera is chrome without the peering eyes.
They will have to pry Mozilla out of my dead hands before I switch to anything else.
Yes it’s buggy but I love it.