Netcraft Web Server Survey

Netcraft

The Netcraft Web Server Survey

The Netcraft Web Server Survey is a survey of Web Server software usage on Internet connected computers. We collect and collate as many hostnames providing an http service as we can find, and systematically poll each one with an HTTP request for the server name.
In the June 2000 survey we received responses from 17,119,262 sites.

Market Share for Top Servers Across All Domains August 1995 - June 2000

Top Developers

Developer	May 2000	Percent	June 2000	Percent	Change
Apache	9095140	60.44	10704306	62.53	2.09
Microsoft	3171467	21.07	3488762	20.38	-0.69
iPlanet	1126787	7.49	1199014	7.00	-0.49

Top Servers

Server	May 2000	Percent	June 2000	Percent	Change
Apache	9095140	60.44	10704306	62.53	2.09
Microsoft-IIS	3168831	21.06	3485995	20.36	-0.70
Netscape-Enterprise	1083161	7.20	1154558	6.74	-0.46
Rapidsite	277147	1.84	294193	1.72	-0.12
Zeus	301073	2.00	220395	1.29	-0.71
thttpd	204187	1.36	218989	1.28	-0.08
WebLogic	90609	0.60	204733	1.20	0.60
WebSitePro	106327	0.71	100113	0.58	-0.13
Stronghold	89682	0.60	91417	0.53	-0.07
WebSTAR	81901	0.54	87311	0.51	-0.03

iPlanet is the sum of sites running iPlanet-Enterprise, Netscape-Enterprise, Netscape-FastTrack, Netscape-Commerce, Netscape-Communications, Netsite-Commerce & Netsite-Communications.

Microsoft is the sum of sites running Microsoft-Internet-Information-Server, Microsoft-IIS, Microsoft-IIS-W, Microsoft-PWS-95, & Microsoft-PWS.

Platform groupings are here.

Around the Net

Apache goes past 10 million sites

Apache gained well over a million sites from the May survey, and sailed past the 10 million sites threshold. Part of the strength of the gain came as a result of a depression in the May survey when sites at the large German hosting company xlink.net failed to respond.

A hosting system with some 90,000 sites located at Digital Nation replaced Zeus with Apache, reducing Zeus's total number of sites by around a third.

Akamai adopt Windows 2000 for streaming media caching

Akamai has been one of the leading proponents of Linux systems, using a huge number of Linux based systems for its http caching topology, and was recently reported as taking 20% of VA Linux's output. However, it seems to have adopted Windows 2000 for caching streaming media, with at least a few hundred systems already in place running Windows 2000. Windows 2000 has not previously been thought of a fabric of the internet infrastructure, and to see the leading caching company adopt it alongside a large existing Linux infrastructure will shock many.

Sites in US Export Restricted countries

It has been pointed on that the domain query form on the front page of the Netcraft site can be used to search for US web servers and operating systems in use in US Export restricted domains, including Libya, Cuba, Iraq, Iran, Korea, Syria and Sudan. Iraq, North Korea, Syria, and Sudan seem to have no sites in the national top level domain, while although there are over a hundred .ly sites, none seems to be actually hosted in Libya. However, Iran has internet connectivity, with over a hundred sites running on contemporary technology ranging from Red Hat Linux to Microsoft NT, as does Cuba, which has even seen some adoption of Windows 2000. Cuba also has some use of SSL technology, with www.ccw.cu notably using a certificate signed by a Cuban Certificate Authority.

Dogfood

Following last months article on the removal of MacOSX from the www.apple.com load balancing pool, it has been pointed out that many of the Mac community sites also run on Unix based systems.

At time of writing MacAddict run Apache on Linux, while MacCentral and MacOSRumors run Apache on FreeBSD, and MacWeek and MacWorld. run Netscape-Enterprise on Solaris. Ironically, Apple have now reintroduced MacOSX into the www.apple.com load balancing pool, where it serves around 20% of requests.

Elsewhere, other vendor specific publications often do run the technology that they write about, even when this is outside the mainstream. Oracle Magazine runs Oracle Web Listener on Solaris. Similarly, SCO World run Netscape-FastTrack on SCO Unix.

However, many of the Windows magazines avoid running NT on their own sites. MaximumPC run Apache on Linux and PC Magazine run Apache on Solaris, as does Windows Magazine. ZDNet publish a number of PC magazines, but use Netscape-Enterprise on Solaris to run their web site, just like PC World. while Win98 Magazine run Apache and BSD/OS. The exception that proves the rule is Windows NT Magazine which loyally runs Microsoft-IIS on NT4.

Reports and Interactive Queries

Reports are provided showing server usage for the Internet as a whole, and for selected domains, with links to all the sites responding to the survey. A facility for you to check what server a particular site is running now is also available. The same form can be used to ensure that a particular site is included in future surveys. A directory of sites running in developer domains is also provided, while the sites discovered by the survey can be explored.

Fair Use, Copyright

Excerpts from this survey may be reproduced if Netcraft and the url http://www.netcraft.com/survey/ are attributed.

Your comments and criticism are much appreciated.