Microsoft's browser continues to lose share of worldwide usage, but its new Internet Explorer 9 version managed to gain enough usage that new statistics show it surpassing one smaller rival, Opera.
Chrome and Safari gained while IE and Firefox lost share of worldwide browser usage from March to April. Credit: Net Applications
Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) accounted for 2.41 percent of browser usage in April, its first full month on the market, according to Net Applications. Opera accounted for 2.14 percent. IE overall dropped from 55.9 percent in March to 55.1 percent in April.
Two browsers, Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari, outpaced the overall growth in web usage. Chrome rose from 11.6 percent to 11.9 percent, while Safari grew from 6.6 percent to 7.2 percent. Mozilla's Firefox dipped from 21.8 percent to 21.6 percent.
For more on this ZDNet UK-selected story, see IE9 passes Opera in browser usage on CNET News.
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Talkback
It's still good news that IE9 has managed to gain enough usage. I still used to using the browsers based on IE, such as Avant Browser maxthon which I have been using for a long time.