Microsoft: IE 9 Approaching 10 Percent Usage Share on Windows 7

Microsoft reports this weekend that its recently-released Internet Explorer 9 web browser continues to race up the usage share charts, achieving almost 10 percent share for Windows 7 users in April. (The company cites market research from NetApplications.) This month’s share report from Net Applications continues to show some great momentum around Internet Explorer 9 on Windows 7, with share about to pass 10% for the last day in April. For the entire month this averages 7.5% usage share on Windows 7– doubling the usage share number of 3.6% in March. With Windows 7 selling more than 350 million licenses in the 18 months since its release, more and more people every day are enjoying better web experiences with Windows 7 and IE9. NetApplications, for its part, semi-rhetorically wonders whether Microsoft’s strategy of skipping Windows XP support in IE 9 makes sense. And then decides it does. After one month, Internet Explorer 9 is benefiting from Windows 7 momentum and has doubled its usage share on Windows 7 from 3.6% last month to 7.5% in April.  Also, Internet Explorer 9's daily usage share for the last day of the month (April 30th) hit 9.95% worldwide on Windows 7. I think I’ve been clear about this, but to reiterate: Speaking general, Microsoft’s biggest problem these days is not moving aggressively enough, and that’s true whether you’re talking about Windows Phone updates, Windows Live Essentials, Windows-based tablets, or virtually anything else. So is Microsoft “skipping” XP support the right thing? Duh. Of course it is. I wish more of the company would take this cue from the IE guys and move as aggressively in their own markets.