In the battle of the internet web browser giants, the incumbent champion, Microsoft's Internet Explorer has now been ousted as 2008 upstart Google Chrome has become the most popular in the world.


Chrome has finally leapfrogged Microsoft’s Internet Explorer just six months after eclipsing Safari and Firefox, an offering by the nonprofit Mozilla Foundation that Google has helped support, to claim the second spot, StatCounter said.

During the past week Chrome had 33% of the global market, versus 32% for Internet Explorer and 25% for Firefox, according to StatCounter. Chrome had briefly reached the No. 1 spot for one day a few months ago, but it had never reigned atop the standings for a full week.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Google spokeswoman Lily Lin said: “It’s great to see more and more people around the world experiencing the speed, simplicity and security of Chrome. We continue to remain focused on building a better browsing experience so that people can enjoy a better web.”



The conflict continues as Google competes with both Microsoft and Apple across platforms, to say nothing of its battle over mobile formats.