Ad network Chitika reports that Chrome OS usage has increased by 700 percent since June 2012.
This data, while encouraging, needs to be qualified: Web traffic from Chrome OS users still represents less than .1 percent of all North American desktop and laptop-based Web traffic.
Chitika reports: “To quantify this study, Chitika Insights analyzed hundreds of millions of online ad impressions within the Chitika Ad Network from January 12th through January 18th, 2013. The team then evaluated Chrome OS usage share, and compared it to the usage share of the PlayStation and Nintendo Wii – two devices with similar rates of usage as of our last study.”
The firm’s user agent analysis showed that Chromebooks currently account for 0.07 percent of traffic to the company’s network, while the Wii makes up just 0.02 percent, and the PlayStation comes in first at 0.08 percent.
The fact that PlayStation’s share of North American Web traffic was nearly 300 percent larger than Chrome OS in June 2012, and is only about 15 percent greater now, might indicate brisk holiday sales for Chromebooks and greater acceptance of the Chrome OS.
And with continued marketing steam expected from the touch-based Chromebook Pixel, the HP Pavilion 14 Chromebook and Lenovo’s ThinkPad Chromebook, Chitika expects more good news to follow.
