According to Market Share, Apple Computer's Safari browser is continuing to fight it's way through the Internet browser arena, taking on the likes of Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft's Internet Explorer to rise by 46% year-over-year. Safari remains the third most popular browser with Internet Explorer topping the charts and Firefox taking second place but the statistics are much in Safari's favor.

In August 2005, Safari's market share was 2.20 percent.  In August 2006, its market share comes in at 3.21 percent.  The rise from 2.20 to 3.21 represents a year-over-year growth of 46 percent for the month of August.  In July 2006, Safari had a 3.18 percent market share and experienced a 0.94 percent increase in just one month. Of course, as you will know the Safari browser is only available on Mac OS X, leading some critics to believe that Safari's market share is directly related to an increase in Mac sales.

Of course, Mac sales have increased, particularly after the integration of Intel-chips into Macs but what critics don't take into account are those who have switched from Firefox and Internet Explorer (especially after Microsoft stopped updating IE for Macs) to Safari as the browser has improved. Whatever the reason, Safari's market share is likely to increase again as browser developers feel the full-force of the Intel Mac.