The latest monthly NetMarketShare reports contain a few eyebrow-raising numbers. Windows 8 is up sharply, XP usage has plummeted, and Google's Chrome browser seems to be falling out of favor. But this month's report might need a big asterisk to account for a key methodology change.
On the first day of each month, the good folks at Net Applications release their NetMarketShare statistics, which measure worldwide usage share of desktop and mobile operating systems and browsers.
This month’s numbers, covering August 2013, contain several eyebrow-raising blips:
• After posting steady but unspectacular monthly gains since its launch last October, Windows 8 usage spiked up dramatically, going from 5.42 percent to 7.65 percent of worldwide web usage in the course of a single month.
• Windows XP usage, which had been dropping at a similarly steady but unremarkable pace, suddenly and dramatically plummeted from 37.19 percent to 33.66 percent.
• Google’s Chrome browser showed a sudden drop in usage, plunging in one month from 17.76 percent to 16 percent. Every other browser gained in percentage terms, with Internet Explorer hitting a two-year high of 57.6 percent.
With a worldwide installed base of nearly 1.5 billion PCs, each one of those moves represents a shift of tens of millions.
Read more at: New stats show Windows 8 usage up sharply as XP usage plummets | ZDNet