Ferguson Photography & Design

Web and Browser Statistics

When designing or updating a site, it is important to determine how your customers will use and view your site. Will your customers be using smaller or older computers with low resolution monitors? If so, using a static wide site design will frustrate them as they continually have to scroll left and right while reading. Will your customers be using newer high resolution screens and modern computers? If so, using a narrow site design that only fills a small percentage of their screen may look "unimpressive". Will your customers be visiting your site from work or secure areas where javascript may be block for security reasons? Will a high percentage of your customers be viewing from a mobile device? What browsers will your viewers be using? Usage statistics give us some of the answers.

Ferguson Photography and Design includes a full evaluation of your hosting needs with all custom design sites, e-commerce sites and site redesigns. So, if the following is confusing or intimidating, you can just ignore it and let us do the worrying!

Here are some statistics on USA and Canadian web use and browsers choice to help you decide how to best use the web and plan your website. These are "general" statistics, averaged from a number of sources for the year 2018-2019. Always take into account what your customers need and want. There is no "one right answer" in the charts and usage statistics below. A client building a site for a medical office serving low income customers should come to very different conclusion than a client offering architecture services in Beverly Hills!

"Desktop" below refers to laptop and desktop computers, "Mobile" refers to smart phones and tablets.


Monitor Width in Pixels
  Percentage of Desktop Viewers
1900 or larger   28%
1600   24%
1440   7%
1280    8%
1024    5%
800   3%
Unknown    25%

Desktop Screen Resolution Statistics

Everything on the web is measured in pixels, rather than inches. Our site is 1800 pixels wide and will be "about" 18.75 inches wide on "most" large computer screens. However, if the viewer chooses to alter their screen resolution (System Preferences on a Mac, Control Panels on a PC) then this site may be 12 inches wide or 26 inches wide. It is the viewer's decision, not the website owner's decision!

Custom designed websites will be made any width the client would like. The vast majority of custom sites we design are "responsive", meaning they adjust to the size of the viewer's screen.


Browser
  Percentage of Desktop Viewers
Chrome   58%
Safari   20%
Microsoft Edge    11%
FireFox   5%
Opera    5%
Other/Unknown   1%

Desktop Browsers Usage Statistics

Web browsers are what your clients use to view websites. The issue while designing a website is that different browsers can read identical page code and display differing results.

Google's "Chrome" browser is now the most used, with 60% usage. Available as a free download for both Macs and PCs. Very similar to Apple's Safari browser in its programing needs. For more info, or to download a free copy of Chrome, visit Google's Chrome site

FireFox is a nice alternative browser. It is more popular amongst enthusiasts and consumers than in corporate workplaces. It is also available free. FireFox is available for both Mac and PC. For more info, or to download a free copy of FireFox, visit the FireFox site.

Safari is a very nice browser and is reasonable conforming to the W3C's official coding guidelines. Safari comes preloaded on all Mac computers. While there is a version for Windows available, Apple seems to have stopped updating or maintaining it.

Microsoft's "Edge" and "Internet Explorer"are both popular browser, primarily because they come free and preloaded with almost all PC computers. "Edge" is the newest version, "Internet Explorer" is no longer in production. Internet Explorer and Edge are PC only browsers, there are no current Mac versions. Internet Explorer is not the best browser out there (in our opinion) and it has a significant number of idiosyncrasies that do not conform to the W3C's official coding guidelines.

Opera is also available for Mac and/or PC as a free download.


Browser
  Percentage of Mobile Viewers
iPhone (Apple Safari)   50%
Chrome   44%
Samsung Browser   3%
Other/Unknown   3%

Mobile Browsers Usage Statistics

This is the percentage of web use, not the percentage of phones/tablets owned. There is significantly more than 41% ownership of Android phones/tablets, but the iPhone users make more web visits. Chrome users may be on either Android or Apple systems.


Javascript Statistics

Javascript is a programming language that Ferguson Photography and Design uses on most websites to add some interesting functionality. Go to the top of this page and mouse your curser over the "Web Design" navigation link, it will turn gray. Javascript is creating a drop down menu of the options for that category (Over View, Planning, Types, Names, Hosting) appearing below the button.

98% or more of the general web public runs javascript on their browsers. But, 2% or less of the public has it turned off. Usually this is due to security concerns. When Ferguson Photography and Design uses javascript we always try and insert coding to allow the non-users a viable option. For example, the non javascript user will still see and be able to use the navigation on this page. However, they will see all of the buttons slightly off-center (to the left). Without javascript the buttons can't self center, but do remain fully functional. Because we use javascript to hide our email address from spammers, our email links also will be replaced.

A note for the truly "geeky": Javascript and Java are two separate programming languages.


Desktop Operating Systems Statistics

Operating System
  Percentage of Desktop Viewers
Windows Overall   58%
Mac OSX   31%
Chrome    8%
Linux    2%
Other / Unknown    1%

These Operating System statistics are more a matter of interest than concern. All sites at Ferguson Photography and Design are tested on both Windows and Mac OSX.


Mobile Operating Systems Statistics

Operating System
  Percentage of Desktop Viewers
Mac OSX   55%
Android   45%
Samsung   1%
Other / Unknown   9%

These Operating System statistics are more a matter of interest than concern. All sites at Ferguson Photography and Design are tested on both Windows and Mac OSX.