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Usage share of operating systems

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Template:OS marketshare Different categories of computers use a wide variety of operating systems, and the usage share varies enormously from one category to another.

In some categories a single family of operating systems is dominant. For example, most desktops use Microsoft Windows and most supercomputers use Linux. In other categories, such as smartphones and servers, there is greater diversity and competition.

Information about operating system share is difficult to obtain. In most of the categories below, there is no reliable primary source or methodology for its collection.

Desktop and laptop computers

There is little openly published information on the usage share of desktop and laptop computers.

In a speech to investors in February 2009, Steve Ballmer of Microsoft presented a slide based on Microsoft's research: while it showed no figures, the pie chart depicted Linux and Apple as each having roughly 5–6% of home and business PCs.[1]

Web client usage share (see below) is often used as a proxy for desktop share, but many such computers are not used for web surfing. Web client stats suggest that Microsoft Windows has about an 87% share, Apple Mac OS 7% and Linux 1%. The correlation between desktop share and web client share is also being challenged by mobile web access, which rose through 1% in 2009 and 4% in 2010.[2]

Microsoft's CFO Peter Klein stated in July 2010 that Windows 7 now runs on more than 15% of all PCs worldwide.[3] A Forrester Research study of desktop operating systems used in North American and European companies in 2010 found Windows 7 on 10% of all commercial desktops, Windows XP on 75% and Vista on 7%.[4]

Web clients

The following information on web clients is obtained from the User agent information supplied to web servers by web browsers. This is an inexact science for a variety of reasons. For a discussion on the shortcomings see Usage share of web browsers.

The most recent data from various sources published during the last six months is summarized in the table below. (All of these sources monitor a substantial number of web sites. Statistics that relate to a single web site are excluded.)

Source Date Microsoft Windows Apple Linux Symbian
OS 		Black-
Berry
OS 		Other
7 Vista XP All
versions 		Mac
OS 		iOS main-
stream 		Android
AT Internet [1] Jan. 2011 24.7% 18.0% 45.7% 89.6% 6.5% 2.2% 0.9% --- --- --- 0.80%
Clicky Web Analytics [2] Mar. 2011 26.80% 13.29% 34.99% 81.43% 13.05% 2.67% 1.21% 0.97% 0.09% 0.31% 0.27%
Net Market Share [3] [4] Mar. 2011 24.17% 10.56% 54.39% 89.58% 5.25% 1.87% 0.96% 0.56% 0.34% 0.13% 1.31%
Global Stats [5] [6] [7] Mar. 2011 29.16% 13.02% 45.10% 87.69% 6.22% 1.58% 0.72% 0.76% 1.44% 0.66% 0.93%
StatOwl [8] Mar. 2011 28.02% 17.09% 40.05% 86.60% 12.52% --- 0.65% --- --- --- 0.23%
W3Counter [9] Mar. 2011 29.13% 12.83% 40.46% 82.76% 8.88% 1.88% 1.43% 0.70% --- 0.42% 3.93%
Webmasterpro [10] Mar. 2011 30.6% 17.4% 39.8% 89.3% 5.9% 2.6% 1.3% 0.5% 0.2% 0.01% 0.19%
Wikimedia [11] Mar. 2011 26.96% 14.60% 39.63% 81.78% 7.73% 3.48% 1.53% 1.00% 0.19% 0.40% 3.89%
Median Mar. 2011 27.49% 13.95% 40.26% 87.15% 7.12% 2.20% 1.09% 0.73% 0.20% 0.36% 0.87%

Notes:

  • The 'Other' column is obtained by summing Windows 'all versions' through BlackBerry OS and subtracting from 100%.
  • AT Internet measures 23 European countries.
  • Clicky Web Analytics does not publish desktop/mobile split so mean of Net Market Share and StatCounter figures (4.31% mobile) used in lieu. Figures are averages over last 7 days of month.
  • StatOwl measures predominantly US web sites with "broad appeal".[12] Figure for XP includes Server 2003. Excludes mobile usage.
  • W3Counter shows only the top ten operating systems and is based on the last 15,000 page views to each of over 45,000 web sites tracked.
  • Webmasterpro samples over 100,000 predominantly German-language sites. Figures are averages over last 7 days of month.
  • Wikimedia uses 1:1000 sampling of its logs when deriving the usage numbers. Figure for Vista includes Server 2008; XP includes Server 2003.
  • iOS figures include iPhone, iPod and iPad.
  • Mac OS X is broken down by four of the sources listed above and all of them show that version 10.6 (Snow Leopard) is the most widely used.
  • Clicky Web Analytics, StatOwl and Wikimedia indicate that Ubuntu has an order of magnitude more usage than any other identified desktop Linux distribution.

Netbooks

The netbook market has been dominated by Microsoft Windows, with Linux in second place.

Initially, Linux dominated the netbook market when Asus started it with the Eee PC in October 2007, but this lead did not last long. Asus and Acer, which accounted for 90% of the early netbook market, installed Linux on 30% of their machines.[5]

Microsoft responded by extending the life of XP. By February 2009, Microsoft cited data from NPD Retail Tracking Service which showed that US market share of Windows on netbooks went from under 10% to 96%.[6]

In November 2009, an analyst at ABI said that of the 35 million netbooks to ship globally in 2009, 68% would have Windows and 32% Linux.[7]

According to DisplaySearch, netbooks and tablets rose from just under a 14% share of the overall portable computer market in third quarter of 2008 to around 20% in the second quarter of 2009, and remained at around 20% until the middle of 2010. During 2010, Apple's iPad tablet computer gained a 6.5% share of this market sector in the first quarter and DisplaySearch forecast this will rise to 30% in the second.[8]

Mobile devices

Share of 2010 Q4 smartphone sales to end users by operating system, according to Gartner.[9]

Mobile operating systems that can be found on smartphones include Symbian OS, iOS, RIM's BlackBerry, Windows Mobile (marketed as Windows Phone), Linux, webOS and Android. Android and webOS are in turn built on top of Linux, and the iOS is derived from the BSD and NeXTSTEP operating systems, which all are related to Unix.

Source Date Symbian
OS 		BlackBerry iOS Linux based Windows
Phone 		Other
Android Linux webOS
Gartner [10] Q3 2010 36.6% 14.8% 16.7% 25.5% 2.1% 2.8% 1.5%
Canalys[11] Q3 2010 33% 15% 17% 25% 3%
Stat Counter[12] November 2010 31.93% 19.25% 21.94% 11.61% 0.44%
NPD Group (US only)[13] Q3 2010 22% 23% 44%
Canalys (US only) [11] Q3 2010 24.2% 26.2% 43.6% 3.0%
Millenial Media (US only)[14] August 2010 19% 48% 26% 3%
Nielsen Company (US only)[15] March 2011 2% 22% 27% 37% 3% 10%
Comscore (US only)[16] February 2011 28.9% 25.2% 33.0% 2.8% 7.7%
AdMob [17] August 2009 34% 8% 40% 7% 4% 4%
In-Stat[18] 2009 44.0% 19.2% 19.8% 4.5% 0.9% 9.0% 2.6%

Notes:

  • The above table is share of smartphone OSs - not overall marketshare.
  • StatCounter measures share of mobile web browsing
  • AdMob measures share of mobile advertisement served for mobile web browsing

In July 2010 ABI Research published a report suggesting that the number of Linux-based initiatives, including Google Android and Chrome OS, MeeGo and webOS, means that a Linux-based OS will ship on 62% of mobile devices by 2015.[19][20]

Servers

Server market share of software sold through commercial channels can be measured by two methods - market share by units sold or market share by revenue. However, these methods may undercount the share of open source operating systems currently in use, since such operating systems may be obtained for free with or without a support plan and may be loaded onto machines that did not ship preloaded with them.

Another method is to survey publicly accessible servers, such as web servers on the Internet, and determine the operating system powering such servers by inspecting response messages. This method gives alternative insight into market share of operating systems actually installed on those servers, as opposed to the ones sold. This method, however, only includes servers publicly accessible on Internet, and excludes all other servers.

Source Date Method Linux Microsoft Windows Unix Other References
All Unix BSD Solaris Other Unix
W3Techs September 2010 Units (Web) 63.7% 33.7% 2.7% 2.4% 0.1% 0.2% <0.1% [21][22][23]
IDC Q1 2010 Revenue 16.2% 48.9% 22.2% [24]
Security Space July 2009 Units (Web) 74.29% 20.36% 5.35% 5.35% [25][26]
Netcraft Jan 2009 Units (Web) 41.02% 41.59% 5.54% 3.30% 1.90% 0.34% 11.83% [27]
Gartner 2007 Revenue 23.2% 66.8% 6.8% [28][29]

Notes:

  • Netcraft survey in January 2009 checked 1,014,301 publicly accessible Web servers with valid SSL certificates.
  • Security Space survey in August 2009 checked 38,549,333 publicly accessible Web servers.
  • W3Techs survey in September 2010 checked the top 1 million Web servers (according to Alexa).

Mainframes

IBM System z has a 90-95% share of the mainframe computer hardware market.[30]

Operating systems for IBM System z generation hardware include IBM's bundled proprietary z/OS,[30] Linux on System z and as at October 7, 2008; 16 years ago (2008-10-07) the prototype OpenSolaris for System z.

Gartner reported on December 23, 2008; 15 years ago (2008-12-23) that Linux on System z was used on approximately 28% of the "customer z base" and that they expected this to increase to over 50% in the following five years.[31]

Of Linux on System z, Red Hat and Novell compete to sell RHEL and SLES respectively.

  • Prior to 2006, Novell claimed a market share of 85% or more.
  • Red Hat has since claimed 18.4% in 2007 and 37% in 2008.[32]
  • Gartner reported at the end of 2008 that Novell had an 80% share of mainframe Linux.[31]

Supercomputers

Graph of supercomputer OS market share from around 1994 to 2010 according to TOP500.[33]

The TOP500 project lists and ranks the 500 fastest supercomputers that benchmark results are submitted for. It then publishes the collected data twice a year. The November 2010 figures show Linux in the lead at 91.8%, followed by IBM AIX at 3.4% and Microsoft Windows HPC Server 2008 at 1.0%. A use of mixed operating systems accounts for 3.2%, and others account for 0.6%.[34][35]


Source Date Linux IBM AIX Mixed Microsoft HPCS 2008 Other References
TOP500 November 2010 91.8% 3.4% 3.2% 1.0% 0.6%. [34][35]

See also


References

  1. ^ Holwerda, Thom (25 February 2009). "Ballmer: Linux Bigger Competitor than Apple". osnews.com.
  2. ^ http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_vs_desktop-ww-monthly-200812-201011
  3. ^ "Windows 7, Office Drive Record Microsoft Revenue". Top Tech News. 23 July 2010.
  4. ^ "Updated 2010: Windows 7 Commercial Adoption Outlook". Forrester Research. 2 November 2010.
  5. ^ Culpan, Tim; Bass, Dina (6 November 2008). "Microsoft Missing Netbook Growth as Linux Wins Sales (Update2)". Bloomberg.com.
  6. ^ "Windows on Netbook PCs: A Year in Review". Windows Experience Blog.
  7. ^ Lai, Eric (4 November 2009). "Linux's share of netbooks surging, not sagging, says analyst". computerworld.com.
  8. ^ Smith, Tony (17 June 2010). "iPad gouges netbook sales". The Register. Retrieved 18 January 2011.
  9. ^ "Google Android smacks down Windows Mobile in latest Gartner data". ZDNet (Press release). 19 May 2010. Retrieved 19 May 2010.
  10. ^ "Gartner Says Worldwide Mobile Phone Sales Grew 35 Percent in Third Quarter 2010; Smartphone Sales Increased 96 Percent". 10 November 2010.
  11. ^ a b "Apple takes the lead in the US smart phone market with a 26% share". 2 November 2010.
  12. ^ "StatCounter Global Stats: Top 8 Mobile OS in Nov 2010".
  13. ^ "The NPD Group: Android Extends its Smartphone Market Share in the Third Quarter of 2010". 2 November 2010.
  14. ^ "The continued growth in popularity of the iPad is represented in the latest data from ad firm Millennial Media, which found that iPad ad requests grew 76 percent month over month".
  15. ^ "U.S. Smartphone Market: Who's the Most Wanted?". 26 April 2011.
  16. ^ "comScore Reports February 2011 U.S. Mobile Subscriber Market Share". Comscore.
  17. ^ "August 2009 Mobile Metrics Report" (PDF). 30 September 2009.
  18. ^ "Global market share for smart phone operating systems in 2009".
  19. ^ Clarke, Gavin (16 July 2010). "Linux to eclipse Microsoft's 'all-in' tablet enthusiasm". The Register. Retrieved 18 July 2010.
  20. ^ "Linux for Mobile Devices". ABI Research. Retrieved 18 July 2010.
  21. ^ "Usage of operating systems for websites". W3Techs. 7 September 2010.
  22. ^ "Usage of Unix for websites". W3Techs. 7 September 2010.
  23. ^ "Usage of Linux for websites". W3Techs. 7 September 2010.
  24. ^ "Worldwide Server Market Revenues Increase 4.7% in First Quarter as Market Demand Improves Sharply, According to IDC". IDC. 28 May 2010.
  25. ^ "Web Server Survey". Security Space. 1 August 2009.
  26. ^ "OS/Linux Distributions using Apache". Security Space. 1 August 2009.
  27. ^ "Operating System Share by Groups for Sites in All Locations January 2009".
  28. ^ "Dataquest Insight: Operating System Software Market Share Analysis, Worldwide, 2007". Gartner.
  29. ^ Wakabayashi, Daisuke (27 February 2008). "Microsoft sees Windows gaining server market share". Reuters.
  30. ^ a b "IBM Tightens Stranglehold Over Mainframe Market; Gets Hit with Antitrust Complaint in Europe". Computer & Communications Industry Association. 2 July 2008.
  31. ^ a b "Vendor Rating: Novell, 2008". Gartner RAS Core Research Note G00162399. 23 December 2008. Retrieved 23 November 2009.
  32. ^ Claybrook, Bill (1 September 2009). "Red Hat bolsters Linux for mainframes, tries to catch Novell". SearchDataCenter.com. Retrieved 23 November 2009.
  33. ^ "Top500 OS chart". Retrieved 18 January 2011.
  34. ^ a b "Operating system Family share for 11/2010". Top 500 project.
  35. ^ a b "Operating System share for 11/2010". Top 500 project.
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