Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE for short), and the open-source Mozilla Firefox are the two internet browsers which enjoy the largest market dominance. As of November 07, IE holds 57% of the browser market while Firefox holds around 36%. However, Firefox is growing rapidly and if it continues to do so at the same pace it will have over-taken IE within two years.
Firefox has often introduced new features before Internet Explorer has, and this has no doubt fueled its popularity, especially among “power-users”, people who are well acquainted with computers. Tabbed browsing is probably the best example of this. Although Mozilla did not come up with the idea they implemented tabs well before Internet Explorer did and used it as a major selling-point. Another major and innovative feature introduced was applications – extensions made by the community to add to the feature-set.
However, Microsoft, clearly aware of the threat Firefox poses on IE, included many of the features that made Firefox unique, such as tabbed browsing and RSS feeds in their latest implementation of their browser, IE7. One of the advantages that IE posses is its reduced start-up time compared to Firefox, as part of the program is loaded as Windows boots.
One of the reasons that Internet Explorer has enjoyed such a large market share for such a long time is that IE comes bundled with Microsoft Windows. Yet the market share that Firefox possesses is increasing, as more and more people become aware of IE alternatives and their benefits, no doubt fueled by the media’s critical eye on the lack of security in the latest IE browsers.
It seems that the days of Internet Explorer dominating the browser market are numbered, as more and more people make the switch more IE to Firefox. Yet as Microsoft plays catch-up, and starts to match the features present in Firefox, there is no indication of which browser will lead the future of web browsing.
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