Browser support in 2010
As browsers are rolling out significant updates more and more frequently Id like to open the discussion of supported browsers by web developers and the requirements of our clients. Manifest Digital’s stand has been “Manifest supports the 2 most recent Major versions of IE, FF and Webkit (Safari and Chrome)” Most recently, Chrome went from a version 0 prerelease Beta to version 4 in a matter of months. FF has released extremely significant minor version updates from v3 to v3.5 to v3.6. These minor number updates have major functionality updates and feature upgrades.
**my real question:**
What browsers and what versions should we as industry leaders be supporting as part of our standard offering?
Yes, I know, as I am experiencing it currently, clients are still requiring outdated browsers and client requirements are client requirements. That said, we always make the recommendation and suggest we target more modern browsers for security reasons.
Google has officially announced it “will be phasing out support for Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 as well as other older browsers” for its Google Apps products. If Google can do it, why can’t we?!
My immediate direction is to support the following versions:
IE 7 and 8
Firefox 3 and 3.5
Safari 4 (webkit)
Chrome 3 (webkit)
Interestingly, Chrome has over taken Safari as the 3rd most common browser in use.
- Chrome: 5.20% (up from 4.64% in Dec ‘09)
- IE: 62.18% (down from 62.69% in Dec ‘09)
- Firefox: 24.41% (down from 24.61% in Dec ‘09)
Does the introduction of the Apple iPad give Safari any traction?
With the ability and frequency of updates from all browsers, should we be thinking about different ways of locking down our testing targets? Does it make sense to target certain features like HTML 5 and CSS 3 vs specific browsers? What then about Mobile browsers like the iPhone OS and Android – they don’t have a Flash plugin. (That will have to be another post.)
In conclusion, I ask again: What browsers and what versions should we as industry leaders be supporting as part of our base offering?
Below are stats from two different groups that show the latest trends in browser usage.
Source: StatCounter Global Stats – Browser Version Market Share
February 1st, 2010 at 8:34 pm
Great article Brett. I can’t jump on the Chrome bandwagon until their add-on’s are supported in OSX. From a freelance designer perspective, all I can do is educate clients on web/browser standards. I hardly ever get my point across as I lose them with the word, “browser.” Most people think IE is the only way to navigate the web.
February 2nd, 2010 at 11:25 pm
What we need is an industry-wide push to alert IE6 users their web experience is outdated. I’m thinking a standardized popup adopted by major players. Hopefully Google’s decision gets this ball rolling (side note: heard that their decision was b/c the security breaches in China used IE6 exploits).
February 3rd, 2010 at 7:38 am
Ive recently been integrating http://www.ie6nomore.com/ as part of my initial template development.