Live data from Hacker News

Firefox is losing users fast

data.firefox.com

31–40 of 80 posts

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#31

If they focused more on the browser and spent less time and effort on these weird side projects they'd probably be in a better spot. Some data points if anyone from FF sees this: I try and proselyte users to Firefox as often as I can. The biggest selling point I've had success with so far is the containers feature. The big place I see people going is Brave under the idea it is more private or secure. I'd also love to…

Do you see Brave as more private and secure? Or do you think it gives a false sense of security relative to Firefox?

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#32
post #22

How do you come to this conclusion given that YOY data shows July of last year: 197.8 million active users July of this year: 196.2 million active users

Maybe they looked at the US statistics, 29 million users in July 2019 to 22 million users now is quite the drop.

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#34

Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but from the graphs it seems like there's been barely a change in the last few years? I wouldn't call that fast.

I might be reading something wrong, but in 2019 the number is about 250 million. In 2022 the number is about 200 million. Losing a 5th of their users in a couple years seems like a big change to me?

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#35

Anecdotally, I've noticed an increasing number of websites where basic functionality does not work on desktop Firefox. I now have to open Chrome on a daily basis whereas just a couple years ago I was 100% FF for browsing (not counting using other browsers for front end testing etc). For example, FedEx tracking refuses to work on Firefox. Shapeways (3D printing service) landing page was (is?) broken/non interactive on…

Chrome is the new IE

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#36

Anecdotally, I've noticed an increasing number of websites where basic functionality does not work on desktop Firefox. I now have to open Chrome on a daily basis whereas just a couple years ago I was 100% FF for browsing (not counting using other browsers for front end testing etc). For example, FedEx tracking refuses to work on Firefox. Shapeways (3D printing service) landing page was (is?) broken/non interactive on…

You are giving me bad flashbacks to Internet Explorer websites. When I worked at a large (fortune 500) defense contractor the new timecard portal was ie only. We had no windows machines (we were a SunOS and HPUX shop). Solution was to set up a citrix windows NT environment, so we'd all have go to a separate terminal and remote into these machines to do our time in IE.

For me firefox was failing on some ordering sites, but it turned out to be I had ublock origin on my firefox which some sites won't work with.

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#37
post #2

Is there a general trend of losing web users to mobile? That might explain the slow decline.

It seems there is: https://gs.statcounter.com/platform-market-share#monthly-202...

This definitely seems like a decent explanation in my opinion. Sure Firefox is available on mobile, but on iPhone there's not much point to it since its WebKit anyways, and Androids have Chrome on them by default, which most people are already comfortable with.

I feel like I care more about my browsing experience on my desktop than I do on my phone, and I would guess that's a fairly popular opinion, so on mobile I usually use the default, but on desktop use Firefox.

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#38

Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but from the graphs it seems like there's been barely a change in the last few years? I wouldn't call that fast.

I might be reading something wrong, but in 2019 the number is about 250 million. In 2022 the number is about 200 million. Losing a 5th of their users in a couple years seems like a big change to me?

Hmm I suppose. Got me wondering if this is just a general trend towards mobile browsers instead, so I looked into Chrome statistics:

2014: 1.29 billion

2015: 1.54 billion

2016: 1.88 billion

2017: 2.07 billion

2018: 2.40 billion

2019: 2.64 billion

2020: 2.65 billion

https://backlinko.com/chrome-users

Not that much gained recently it seems. Can't find a good source for 2021 and 2022, but looking at some it may have actually decreased too during that time.

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#39

Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but from the graphs it seems like there's been barely a change in the last few years? I wouldn't call that fast.

I might be reading something wrong, but in 2019 the number is about 250 million. In 2022 the number is about 200 million. Losing a 5th of their users in a couple years seems like a big change to me?

That comparison is between early 2019 and summer 2022. The page mentions usage drops in the summer, and comparing July 2019 to July 2022 is quite close. However, the charts show United States usage has dropped much more significantly.

Re: Firefox is losing users fast

#40
post #2

Is there a general trend of losing web users to mobile? That might explain the slow decline.

Firefox is on mobile, and I much prefer it to Chrome. Just an FYI.

Chrome for Android has no extensions at all. Most webpages are unusable on mobile without extensions like ublock origin or "I don't mind about cookies" (this last one is for removing the annoying warnings about cookies in EU).

Firefox do have ublock origin but is lacking other extensions.

I'm using chromium-based kiwi browser, fast as chrome, with full support for extensions

Post reply on HN