With a wider Internet browser choice, comes an expanded portfolio of consumers with different preferences. Two years back, the browser market was dominated by Internet Explorer (IE), until we felt Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome entering the space. Interestingly, while mature and old internet users still stick to Internet Explorer, a higher percentage of youngsters and women now prefer Chrome or Mozilla as their web browser, says a recent study by Google. Also, as IE is used for news and information search, Chrome is more popular for the entertainment quotient.
The ?Web Browser Usage and Brand Preference? study reveals that Chrome users access internet regularly from home and seldom from cyber caf?. On the other hand, IE and Mozilla users access internet from office most regularly, but they also access internet relatively from cyber caf?.
Nikhil Rungta, marketing head at Google India says, ?Chrome is more often used at home by new age users as it is downloadable product. Chrome is accessible only by downloading it and most of the offices do not allow downloads. Moreover, traditionally the corporate workstations already have Internet Explorer as a part of the Microsoft
Windows package.? Chrome is largely installed by the user himself across all places of access, with 94% of home users of Chrome downloading it themselves.
As per Stat Counter, an internet research firm, Internet Explorer still enjoys the highest share at 38%. Chrome?s global market share has reached to 25% from 16% six months back. This leaves 33% to Firefox and the remaining insignificant share is split amongst Opera, Safari and others.
As Chrome is mostly used at homes, a natural consequence is that its usage is mostly for leisure cum semi-official activities like communication via internet, instant messaging, chatting, job searches and entertainment activities. Whereas an IE user performs information search, checking news and online banking extensively over internet. Social networking websites are relatively more accessed by a Mozilla user.
Apart from usage in homes and cyber cafes, another reason for newer browsers like Chrome and Mozilla to be inclined towards entertainment or social networking could be the age group division among the three browsers. The study reveals that 58% of Chrome users and 50% of Mozilla users are aged between 25-35 years. Simultaneously, IE users are more mature users of internet with 30% of them aged above 36 years.
Its not just in age that IE users are mature. The study notes that IE users are often married and economically much better-off. Chrome and Firefox users are relatively younger, mostly unmarried and economically less well-off. Chrome also shows a noticeably higher representation of ?women? among its user base at 36% as home makers or women working from home prefer the browser. However Rungta smiles, ?Women are the more sorted lot in our society and like things which are more beautiful to the eyes.?
However, the three browsers are facing tough competition against each other?only 1 in 4 internet users in India uses a singular browser exclusively (with 1 in 3 using 3 browsers). This indicates a fairly ?non-differentiated? market, despite it being a highly ?concentrated? one.
Thus, this shows that there is no clear preference when it comes to browsers. Duplicated user base in browser usage stands as high as 31%; corroborating the fact that this market doesn?t is largely undifferentiated.