Net Applications has just released their browser usage statistics for May 2008. The statistics show a 73.8% market share for Internet Explorer, 18.4% for Firefox and 6.3% for Safari. Opera is stuck on 0.7%.

photo: Glutnix

An in-depth analysis shows something quite interesting. The unreleased Firefox 3 already has a market share of 0.78%. With the quite addictive Awesomebar, fresh new interface, revamped bookmarking system and lower memory use, that’s not such a surprise. Firefox 3 is simply a fantastic product.

Opera 9.x, first released in June of 2006 (that’s 2 years ago) has only managed to accumulate a market share of 0.73% in that time.

Week beginning May 25th, 2008

Firefox 2: 17.53%
Firefox 3: 0.78%
Opera 0: 0.73%

That’s right: Opera 9 has had it’s market share eclipsed by a browser which hasn’t even been released yet.

Mozilla’s Asa Dotzler says:

I wonder if Firefox 3 will be able to break 1% global share before it’s even released. That would be pretty crazy.  With millions of people already using the pre-releases of Firefox 3 and the enthusiasm around the arrival of the final release, I have no doubt that we’ll see Firefox well above 20% global market share in the very near term.