Microsoft to unleash Internet Explorer 9

Redmond fights back in browser war

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) will be available from tomorrow, just over a year after the first platform preview of the browser went public.

The final version may have some new features and if this is the case, details will be released tomorrow.

In a blog post, IE business and marketing senior director Ryan Gavin hinted that this was the case by saying that the IE team "still have a few surprises left".

This is a change in position from Microsoft, which said that the release candidate made available in February this year was “feature complete.”

It is possible that the launch of version 10 of Google's Chrome browser earlier this month could have prompted the company to add new features.

The release candidate had many more features than IE8, although this needed to be the case, given the large decline in the use of IE over the past few years.

The latest statistics from browser NetMarketShare indicate that IE's decline in market share from 95 per cent eight years ago may have been halted and could begin to rise.

IE's browser market share had fallen for six consecutive months to 56.0 per cent in January. However, February's figure was 56.8 per cent.

Although Google’s Chrome browser has garnered a 10 per cent market share, the decline in Firefox usage could help IE to regain share.

The drop in Firefox use may be due to Chrome’s rise and the problems Mozilla has experienced in launching the next version of Firefox.