In the first 24 hours since its release yesterday, Firefox 3.5 has been downloaded more than 5 million times. (It took only a few hours to pass a million). That is certainly respectable, but doesn’t quite measure up to the mania that Firefox 3.0 set off last summer, when it achieved a “world record” 8.3 million downloads in a single day. Maybe we’ll have to wait for Firefox 4.0 to beat that record. But Firefox 3.5 might still beat the 11 million downloads Safari 4 got over its first three days of availability.
Who’s.among.us has some live usage stats from about 800,000 Internet surfers it is tracking. According to its data, it estimates that Firefox 3.5 already has gained about a 2.4 percent browser market share. Overall, it puts all versions of Firefox at 29 percent. That suggests close to 10 percent of Firefox users have already upgraded. It also puts Safari’s market share at only 2.5 percent, which seems low. (Other stats put it closer to 8 percent).
Looking at our own Google Analytics for TechCrunch, 28 percent of Firefox visitors are already on 3.5, but our readers are big Firefox fans—nearly half of all visitors use some version of Firefox, which is a much higher percentage than for most sites.
I’ve been playing around with the 3.5 release candidate for about a week. It is much zippier than 3.0, and I’m already addicted to the plus-sign feature on the tab bar which makes it easier to add tabs. And I love where it’s going with open video standards. It is also a bit crashy when I have too many tabs open, but that’s getting better. Some add-ons don’t yet work, but nothing crucial. Overall, it’s a much better product.
I would have downloaded, but some of the extensions I use are not yet compatible with 3.5. I have a feeling this keeps a large number of enthusiasts from upgrading so quickly.
yeah i too faced the same.
many of add-ons like auto copy, customizegoogle, tab mix plus have stopped working
You are right about that but Firefox 3.5 doesn’t need some of those features as add ons. It all ready has some of the features that those add ons have. You can also get most of the add ons in a beta version that works and they dont seem to crash at all
Downloaded… but back to chrome after an hour
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safari who?
Sign of maturity probably, my ol’ firefox works well enough
On What Basis did safari get 11 M downloads in 3 days where as FF3.5 manages ONLY 5M in 1 day?
Safari’s GLOBAL market share is not even 2 %.
Sometimes I wonder do we even have 11M active Mac users?
http://gs.statc...080701-20090702
That last release of Safari was for Windows. That’s what was new. Apple has a reputation (earned or not) for great user interfaces because of the iPod and iPhone. A lot of people were curious about whether their browser would be a great leap forward. They weren’t necessarily switching to it, just checking it out.
I don’t use it, because I won’t give up my FF extensions, and I have a Mac.
Those download numbers are meaningless. I downloaded FF 3.5 a few days ago. It was noticeably faster, but was not compatible with 3 of my most essential extensions.
I backed out of it, and re-installed 3.0.11. I probably made a mistake. I should have kept a copy of 3.5 in addition to my usual 3.0.11, so that I could periodically check to see when my essential extensions are upgraded. I might download it again just for that.
Someone should take a scientific poll (not a web poll) to see why people use FF in the first place. I have good reason to suspect that the extensions are the #1 reason.
I’d also like to see when the Mac version really uses the OS X stuff, like the much larger Mac spelling dictionary (which saves disk space instead of having 2 dictionaries), and all of the extra keyboard shortcuts I defined, some of which are just to insert common fixed strings like my email address and the long name of my home state.
I think for an accurate download tally, you’ll want to add in the number from Download.com, which is where I got my copy since Mozilla.com was tough to get to.
It’s listing 19m downloads but that might be comingling other versions.
You mean the Safari that is bundled with iTunes download? (Yes, I know you can uncheck Safari in the downloads manager, but still it is wrong of Apple to try to slip it unnoticed to its customers).
Hahaha “slip it unnoticed to its customers” it’s not going to harm them if they download it. It’s not a roofie. It’s a good browser maybe not the best but there is no ultimate browser. But Apple gaining more downloads Isn’t really good for them if no one uses it. The thing is if you are downloading safari without knowing then chances are you aren’t going to use it.
It’s going to waste your disk space if you don’t use it. How much time to we spend cleaning up our hard drive? Yes, I know some reckless spenders just add a bigger external drive, but we are in a recession.
And yes, it does help Apple, because they can claim all those iTunes downloads as downloads for Safari for marketing purposes.
I think Firefox has reached the victim of it’s own success phase. If you are happy with your experience and aren’t a first adopter type, you will upgrade when you get around to it, but probably don’t feel a need to rush.
Firefox is great.
I downloaded 3.5 to my Macbook yesterday and I’m already in love with it over 3.0. Firefox 3 had some weird Flash bugs on my Mac that 3.5 has completely fixed… and honestly it just seems a bit faster on my system.
Now to upgrade the XP machine.
If you upgrade your XP machine, your PC will run slower. Vista and Windows 7 are resource hogs. Never upgrade to a new version of Windows until it’s been out for a few years, when a lot of its new bugs have been fixed.
I love it, but PayPal still manages to crash it
Downloaded and started using Firefox 3.5. Its really good. Its not slowing down or crashing like Firefox 3.0.
Firefox 3.0 didn’t crash on me, it was equally good as 3.5 is.
So many people did not download because lot of add-ons or extensions wont work. I did not download it on my 3 laptops because of this trouble. And I don’t know when all the extensions would be updated and I can download FF3.5. I liked its speed on one of my other laptop.
Yeah when the extensions are updated, we should have another download day, and with a better download certificate
I love mine from the 3.0 event it’s awesome
i love FF and less bugs with CSS, sure it will be really number one!
Google adwords doesn’t work on it – beware. I sent it out to my team internally to upgrade and the metrics/ad/business guys were a little upset that it wasn’t working.
Here’s my user gains so far: Complete pvt option, faster, deletes all traces of site visits, browsing history removal for short periods is interesting.
I’m one of those who used to be FF users, but now Google Chrome is a light breeze and nothing can bring me back to FF.
Poor Opera. It’s actually the best browser.
Netscape’s better.
lol…. @Tan The Man
i get the humor
I know what you mean
but I have to say
I.E. 1.0 was the best browser of all
just downloaded it. I think my browser got faster. But how do you benchmark a web browser?
Dragging tabs from window to window works very well now. Dragging a tab to desktop makes a new window out of it. Faster on Ubuntu Intrepid by about a factor of 100% although FF 3 was already stunningly fast compared to MacOSX on a totally souped up MacPro machine with same FF3. Will be putting on Macs as soon as Customizegoogle is up to date.
Firebug updated recently too, not sure if that is why it is blazingly fast compared to yesterday, or FF 3.5. Either way, life changed dramatically with debugging wed pages.
It is definitly faster. And the only real browser for webdeveloper. Love it.
Opera at 0% ?
Those numbers are cooked.
i dont think so. check out the gs.statcounter.com you will have the reality of picture on your face u lazy supper :p
Get it yesterday, yeah, i love the “pluse” as well, but maybe that’s only what we can view by appearance, and i get a speed promotion, very cool!
Firefox 3.0 never told me to update to the newest version today…
You have to download a new version for 3.5, it’ll be fine after installed.
Huge fan of the Firefox browser. When I saw it was available I downloaded it right away. It seems to move very quick and I still would never go back to IE.
I love Firefox because of developer tools, but always have memory problem… do you think they will ever improve it?
I’m not complaining since I have no particular issues with Firefox, but FF 3.5 looks about the same as the last version so far. What am I missing?
Normal scenario:
Dumb user A downloads FF3.5, previously using Chrome, IE, Safari,Opera..watevr. Then they try 3.5 for speed..lol..and guess what just bcoz FF dont have those often visited sites cached for the first time…it takes a bit more or same time as their prev browser.
They conclude that they are IT professionals n they have conducted a very good test. So after one hour they switch back to their ‘good’ old browser. Pity those people…almost most of the people who commented against FF are Mr. A of this example. Grow up folks.
I’ve been using fireox for years. soo much better than internet exporer. Good blog, thanks
30 Awesome Firefox Keyboard Shortcuts
http://www.tech...oard-shortcuts/
I like the new version a lot despite the fact that some add-ons are incompatible with it. But, to tell you the truth, I actually prefer Mozilla’s other browser, Flock.
I am a massive fan of Firefox. Much much faster