Firefox a fail in India; Chrome rules the desktop while UC Browser is favourite among smartphone users
Mozilla’s Firefox is fast losing ground among Indian Internet users. This was revealed by web analytics and statistics firm, StatCounter report for the 3rd Quarter of 2015. The report also said that Alibaba’s UC browser is dominating the Indian mobile market with over 51 per cent share in the browsing space while Google’s Chrome leads the personal computer segment in the country.
UC Browser, the flagship product of UCWeb is one of most popular mobile web browsers. In June, 2014 the company had officially merged into the Chinese largest e-commerce company Alibaba. Before this merger, Alibaba had already held a 66% stake in the company while other 34% was brought during this merging period.
As per the data shared by StatCounter, share of UC browser has grown from around 37.46 per cent to over 51 per cent at the end of September, while share of it’s close competitor Opera mobile browser has came down from 23 per cent to 21.09 per cent.
“India is the world’s fastest growing mobile country and our largest overseas market and we are deeply committed to it. We constantly strive to reach new users through unique customisation and localisation efforts, across genres,” said UCWeb India Managing Director Kenny Ye.
Google’s Chrome is the second browser that is growing in India. In fact, Chrome is the only mobile internet browser that saw growth in its market share from 7.03 per cent to 13.21.However, in personal computer space, Chrome dominates Indian market with 67.85 per cent share and has registered continuous growth.
However Mozilla’s Firefox is witnessing a decline in Indian market. Share of Firefox fell from 24.43 per cent in October 2014 to 22.04 per cent in September 2015.
Despite launching a new browser with Windows 10, Microsoft is unable to make any dent in the Indian Internet users space. Microsoft’s Internet Explorer remains the worst performing browser in India with its share falling from 9.27 per cent to 6.7 per cent during the same period.
In mobile space, Opera is the only other browser that looks to compete against the UC Browser.
