Wait, MacOS and osx on separate lines means that in 2026 almost 20% of global user agents are with a MacOS version released before 2016??
The “os x” line is to be interpreted as “badly coded scraping bots with outdated user agent”, right?
I like to bash on Windows but MacOS jumping overnight from 5% to 20% is a bit unbelievable
Ok that the MacBook neo sold many units, but I don’t think it’s this many.
Those stats are aggregated from web visits so IMHO it’s ai scrapers faking a MacOS user agent to scrape with less suspicion
Probably a combination of user agent spoofing and aggregating mobile browser activity incorrectly
Never get excited or scared about the final data point in a time series. Especially when it’s a ratio metric that will conceal it when the data begins that final data point is still only partial.
It’s right there with never start a land war in Asia and never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line.
This is due to some changes made that statcounter doesn’t apply to their data properly. So statcounter is very unreliable atm.
That looks like a methedology change at the very end.
Theres no way it dropped steadily for a decade then plummeted 20% in a month?
Its also interesting that iOS popped up from zero. What is that? If they’re asking “what is your primary computer,” Android and iOS would both be there and considerably higher, so what does iOS even represent here?
The fucking file system doesn’t even work on windows.
Is delayed enough that is goddamn aggravating. All that fucking stupid onedrive shit, I’m guessing.
Neuter it!
It still works, but you have to strip all those features to keep it usable.
I accidentally opened Edge on my work computer and it simply won’t let you close it until you’ve gone through their inital “welcome” setup. The X on the window doesn’t work, same with the X in the taskbar pop up and right-click close, not even alt-f4 worked. Only thing that actually closed it was going through the task manager.
it’s exactly that. at least the delay that I’ve come across. thankfully it’s been fixed on Windows 11 now, but it’s absolutely mind-blowing how long that was an issue
when I was testing it out, accessing files through the OneDrive path would have the second delay at every folder navigation. if I remapped that directory to a local drive letter then it worked as expected, instant. literally just one drive fucking it up
And OS X has changed its name to macOS:)
Yes, in 2020, as part of a way to market a regular annual OS update. The distinction between OSX and MacOS makes zero sense here.
I know it makes zero sense - that’s what I’m trying to point out. It’s been called Mac OS X, OS X, and macOS in the past 15 years or so ;)
Oh nevermind it’s 2016 actually
Why is iOS listed under “desktop operating systems”?
Yeah, nobody is running a router as their desktop.
Ipad?
I assume they are including tablets as desktops
Possibly, but it doesn’t make sense that Android isn’t there.
Good point.
Ugh
60% is suspiciously low. Most companies use Windows, what is your source?
I made it up
Last time this was posted it came down to many bots run on Linux. Thus if near 60% of all internet traffic is bots. These numbers show nearly nothing of value when it comes to figure out what humans are using anymore.
The truth is that the data isn’t transparent enough, and we have no idea about the causes. Everything is mere speculation
I wish more people would say things like this
Well, the fact of the matter is that the information provided isn’t clear enough with its sources, so we must have doubts about the reasons. All of it is simply throwing shit at the wall to see what will stick.
(If you hadn’t said “like this”, I would have copypasted it… ;-) )
Yeppers. I just wish people could be more capable to say “we really don’t know” instead of jumping to conclusions 🙃
This chart is for desktops, I imagine most bots aren’t running on desktops, right? So if it’s counting bots the methodology is wrong.
They use desktop user agents if they don’t identify themselves with a known bot tag
Yeah, most bots purpose is to spoof what machine and browser they are using for access. So while the many bots are supposed to be spoofing Windows and such, who knows what percentages are getting detected as not. We don’t have the data
Last time this, or something like this, was posted it was because fewer and fewer people are using PCs at home. They just have a smartphone or tablet and that’s it.
In that case they’re not using windows they’re using MacOS or Android.
Every time someone brings this, but that same statcounter site show desktop vs mobile somewhat stabilizing a few years ago, so that’s not a plausible explanation for current trends. Also, we they’re not transparent about their methods or anything, so we can’t really know
It’s because of the recent explosion in bot traffic. Bots are largely run on Linux, using basic desktop user agents. So when studies like this look at desktop traffic, they see a disproportionately high number of Linux desktop users. But in reality, the vast majority of those “users” are actually just bad bots and scrapers who aren’t properly flagging themselves as bots (because they know sites will block them for scraping content).
this is from statcounter.
I mean - I like the numbers, but I doubt their validity:
https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide/#monthly-200901-202608lol, why post it then?
e n g a g e m e n t
What is the “macOS” that apparently launched in 2025? 🤔
It’s been called “macOS” since 2016: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacOS#Timeline_of_releases
It’s been called MacOS since 1997
And more importantly, it’s the same thing as OS X. They shouldn’t be separate lines.
I choose to believe that one of those ‘others’ datapoints is my copy of Freedos.
Freedos and TempleOS
And ReactOS.
People who think 60% is too low haven’t met a young person in a while, I think… virtually everyone in every class I teach uses Apple computers or tablets; I’m absolutely not surprised that’s where most of the change has gone, at least for personal use. (And in the US specifically)
That said, I’d have thought the 30% mac share was earlier than 2010, this suggests that it’s more recent? Apple might as well been running a psyop to get young people to use their products since the 90s. I remember when I was in middle school, they “generously” donated a lab full of those colorful iMacs to my school. Seems it might have been the first computer many of my peers had even touched, too.
People who think 60% is too high haven’t been to any mid-sized business in a while, I think.
People who think 60% is too low haven’t met a young person in a while, I think…
Since last year when it was still around 80%?
The severe drop is probably not permanent, while the gradual downturn probably is.
Newsflash: desktops are dead. We are absolute dinosaurs. Most people dont have one. They only use a phone.
Source: mostly every normie I know.
Because desktops are expensive. You people just can’t afford them. You need to put at least 1k into the PC then another 200 into the screen, then mouse, keyboard, headset, webcam… They are cheaper off buying a phone.
Young people barely own stuff anymore. Their wealth is historically low as the tech barons, land barons, and so on own everything they want: homes, tech, uni debt, subscriptions, everything. And meanwhile the young are expected to work longer hours for less pay. In certain countries their pay is taxed up to 50%, but a wealthy person doesn’t get a salary so they aren’t taxed.
Their parents didn’t do much better either, but they didn’t have it as bad. But it was bad enough that daycare and childcare is fucking expensive, so they shove a phone into the child’s face: now the children know phones from a very young age and are also conditioned to buy one asap because it’s all they know.
So yeah, I don’t blame young people for not owning PCs. Our society has fumbled, is fumbling, and will continue to fumble making it affordable. If we want young people to be more interested in computing beyond telling Claude to write shit for them, we should be worrying about the wealth gap and affordability crisis.
Not completely true. My desktop is 15 years old and ive barely put 400 dollars in it. Used parts. parts from friends throwing stuff. Plays every game I need. Other desktops were from the dumpster or schools throwing them out.
What I mean is, kids dont do that now. Theyre stuck on iPads.
I agree with you still. Its the parents fault completely. The issue is most parents are tech illiterate as well. Downward spiral.
Those people are peasants.
Sucks for them if they have to limit their Internet perspective to a shitty little phone screen. I’d still rather be the cool dinosaur with my gaming desktops with big screens and mechanical keyboards.
My kids love gaming on the desktop computers too - that’s the Trojan horse (games) that gave me motivation to learn how to use computers in the first place. Gotta learn how to work the computer to get the games to work.
Yep I feel the same.
However, you can plug that little crappy phone into a DEX hub with a KB/mouse/monitor and play witcher 3 which is cool.
Not my jam though. I like to actually own my hardware, and be able to repair it. Something phones will never do.
A lot of it was due to how awful windows is, folks gave up trying to work around all the bullshit and said a phone is easier.
I totally feel you. Something to be said for our era where it took work to make games work and that gave me a baseline of computing knowledge. Kids today play on browser or hit download on steam and it works. Which is fine. But they get 0 learning from it. Hence why Young’s are idiots at computers unless parents teach it outright.
Both cloudflare stats and statcounter show desktops with roughly 46% of the marketshare. This is definitely not dead, definitely not an “absolute dinosaurs” thing.
I wonder why people are like that every time a post like this appears. Too much insecurity, perhaps?
Also, somehow, these days, people tend to act like everything below 50% is absolute zero when it comes to tech
Well:
-
“Desktop” includes laptops, just to be clear.
-
I would expect mobile web traffic to be conspicuously low since most use apps instead.
-
It doesnt break down age statistics.
-
Both cloudflare stats and statcounter show desktops with roughly 46% of the marketshare. This is definitely not dead, definitely not an “absolute dinosaurs” thing.
That would depend on the average age of a desktop owner. If it’s all us oldies, I think it still qualifies.
No comment on whether it is true or not, I’m not in touch with trends, just saying that you could maybe find similar rates of ownership of disco records in the 80s, for example, but it was definitely dead as a trend by then…
Well, I have 4 desktops myself. And I assume other nerds have multiple, so that may skew it.
I’m not trying to downplay it but I am just stating that desktops largely dont matter and won’t matter in 10 years. Show me a 13 year old using a desktop. There aren’t any outside of nerd families.
Statcounter measures pageviews, not users or machines.
Market share =/= people
I wonder how China ditching ms is gonna look like on this graph.
