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iPhone doubles its global web share
…thanks to 3G

By Tom Espiner

Published: Tuesday 02 September 2008

The rollout of the iPhone 3G has seen a large increase in iPhone's global web share, according to figures released on Monday.

The figures, collected by web-analytics company Net Applications, show that in June 2008, before the launch of the iPhone 3G, iPhone had 0.16 per cent share of the operating system market, as measured by OS detection during web browsing; and in July, it had 0.19 per cent.

However, as of 1 September, iPhone had 0.3 per cent of global market share, an increase of 58 per cent in one month. According to Net Applications, this was due to the July launch of the iPhone 3G.

A Net Applications report said: "The release of the iPhone 3G has brought large gains in web-browsing share. Prior to the launch, iPhone usage share had levelled off but has since resumed its upward trend."

In the operating system market, Microsoft Windows has had dominance for many years. However, a Net Applications report showed that dominance steadily, if slowly, decreasing. Whereas in October 2007 Microsoft Windows had 92.49 per cent of the operating system market, in August 2008 that figure had dropped to 90.66 per cent.

This fall has coincided with an increase in market share not only for the iPhone but also for Linux and Apple Mac. Linux has steadily increased its market share, from 0.5 per cent in October 2007 to 0.93 per cent in August 2008. In the same time period, Apple Mac increased its market share, from 6.58 per cent to 7.86 per cent.

Microsoft's dominance of browser share is also declining, somewhat faster than its OS share. Internet Explorer usage fell from 78.36 per cent in October 2007 to 72.15 per cent in August 2008. Over the same time period, Firefox increased its market share from 14.97 per cent to 19.73 per cent, while Safari usage increased from 5.09 per cent to 6.37 per cent.

Net Applications collects its figures from the 160 million visitors per month to its customers' sites.