Net Applications, which provides usage share statistics for internet technologies, has released its August browser usage share figures today. These show that Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE8) is the world’s fastest growing browser.

 

IE8 (including compatibility mode and editions) grew its browser market share by 1.17% in August to make out 32.04% of global usage share, which is over three times that of Google Chrome’s 0.36% share growth. Mozilla Firefox’s share remained almost stagnant for August with a slight gain of 0.02% worldwide.

 

The share usage for the passed its prime Internet Explorer 6 has plummeted below 5% in Europe and is also approaching 5% in various other developed markets such as the US, UK as well as France. This ageing browser is still highly favoured in China though, as its usage share in that country is more than 46% (or 50.5% if all editions are included).

 

Microsoft has announced that it will be releasing the Beta version of Internet Explorer 9 on 15 September, which will allow for faster browsing, a revamped graphical solution as well as extended HTML5 support for videos.