Firefox 3.5 tops IE7 as most popular browser

Mozilla's Firefox 3.5 has surpassed Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7 as the most used browser in the world, according to StatCounter.

IE leads by a much wider margin in the US, but Firefox 3.5 overtook Microsoft's browser as the most used in Europe over the summer - despite IE again winning out overall.

In Europe, Firefox 3.5 has 28.4 per cent of the market, over IE8's 21.6 per cent, while in North America IE8 claimed 25 per cent, followed by IE7 at 21.8 per cent and then Firefox 3.5 at 21.7 per cent.

Globally, Google's Chrome has climbed into third place with 5.47 per cent, showing a bit of a rise after a version of the browser was made available for Mac and Linux users earlier this month.

Safari holds 3.4 per cent, followed by Opera at 2.1 per cent.