Apple’s Safari browser now has over one billion users, accounting for almost 20 percent of everyone on the internet.
These numbers are from Atlas VPN (opens in new tab) which conducted a study to identify the most widely used internet browsers. Despite Safari hitting a monumental goal, it doesn’t even come close to Google Chrome’s colossal numbers.
Atlas VPN pulled data from GlobalStates and InternetWorldStats, and according to their numbers, Google Chrome has well over 3.3 billion worldwide users. This means that Chrome takes up a little over 64 percent of the total browser market. After Safari sits Microsoft Edge, Firefox, and Samsung Internet.
- Microsoft Edge takes third place with over 212 million users and a little bit above four percent of the market.
- Firefox is fourth with over 179 million users and around three percent of users
- Fifth is Samsung Internet with nearly 150 million users or 2.85 percent.
Security and availability
Atlas VPN attributes the popularity of most of the top browsers to their wide availability and security features. Chrome is a little different. Atlas VPN claims Chrome’s “application drive design” attracts a lot of people. Google owns a lot of widely used apps like YouTube, Maps, and Drive, which many people use frequently. Those apps, Atlas VPN asserts, lead people to try out Google’s other services and eventually download Chrome.
Safari’s success gets tied to the fact that it’s instantly available on all iPhones and Macs. What expands on that success, according to the study, is the browser’s security features. Namely, its Intelligent Track Prevention feature which prevents bad actors from tracking people across websites.
Microsoft Edge and Samsung Internet are similar to Safari minus the security features. Edge is the default on all Microsoft devices, plus there was that period of time when it was difficult to switch default browsers, which led to an increase in users, according to Atlas. And Samsung’s proprietary browser is on all of its mobile devices, so the app saw high adoption.
Firefox’s popularity is tied to its security features. The browser has tons of extensions that protect people from various forms of malware. It also has the Secure Shell network protocol, which ensures safe communication between devices and is one of the few browsers that support it.
Analysis: Safari’s next potential update
From June 6 to June 10, Apple will be holding its big WWDC 2022 developer conference. People are expecting to see the next iteration of iOS, macOS, and Apple’s new microchip. It’ll be interesting to see what security changes Apple will bring to its software and how it will impact Safari.
2021 was, maybe, not a great year for Apple in terms of security. Expect to see Apple make renewed efforts on that front.
