Estimating the number of Linux users

(or: why we think we're twenty-nine million)

Last updated: march 2005

Note: in this articles, the suffixes K and M are used. (SI).
This is also done to prevent mistakes about comma and dot notation differences in the US / Europe.
M=1.000.000 = 10^6
K= 1.000 = 10^3

It is VERY hard to get any real idea of the size of the Linux community.

In a sense, it is because we want it that way: we do NOT want anything like centralized control, and that means that we don't want anyone to say authoritatively how many people we are, either.

The only number we can be sure of is "many".

The lower limit is something like what is counted in the Linux Counter (140.000 at the moment), but even this is not certain; people may have stopped using Linux after registering, or may be registered under 2 different emails.

The Linux Counter also has several builtin drawbacks:

• Only people who run across mention of it on Linux enthusiast web pages are likely to hear about it, although several important Linux documents also mention it
• Only people with E-mail or Web access can register with it
• Accounts of people who forget to re-visit the website are deleted after two years.
• And most importantly: Only people who *care* to be registered can be counted.

The main reasoning for the estimation is as follows:

In 2001, here at the Linux Counter, it was estimated 18 million users use Linux.
At that moment, around 110k users were registered at the Linux Counter. Nowadays, 140k users are registered at the Linux Counter, but in october 2001 200k users were registered, and the users who didn't visited their accounts within the last two years were deleted.
But, not everyone who didn't visit their account stopped using Linux.
So, if we estimate 40K of the 90K removed users still use Linux, we could estimate 180k unique users should be in the Linux Counter, of which 40k should have visited the Linux Counter to keep their entries alive, but didn't.

As a result of that, the next table emerges:

Calculating the new number of Linux users	June 2001	February 2005
Linux Counter registered users	110K	180K
Estimated Linux users	18M	29M

The number of 29 million is the result of first calculating the factor at which the number of registered Linux Counter members grew (180/110 ~= 1.6)
Then, we apply that factor to the estimated number of Linux users of june 2001 (1.6 x 18M).

There are many other pointers to follow:

• Red Hat's size the market.
  
  The next table emerges:
  
  

  DATE	NUMBER	SOURCE
  Dec 1996	3.5 M	Red Hat's size the market
  Mar 1998	7.5 M	Red Hat's size the market
  Jun 2001	18 M	Linux Counter
  March 2005	29 M	Extrapolation of the other sources

  
  
  The first three rows show a linear growth, and that is extrapolated to the fourth row.
  This is exactly what we stated if we only take the growth in Linux Counter registrants.
  
  
• Gartner estimates in 2002, 500M computers were deployed.
  For several years, Google thinks 1% of the users of internet connected computers use Linux, but this number may be to low.
  If we multiply this 1% with the 500M computers, at least 5M people should use Linux.
  
  
• The LXer database of groups migrating to Linux
  A raw estimate of the computers mentioned here would be 1 million.
  
  
• A consortium called "The China Standard Software" was set up to bring a Linux-based desktop to 200 million Chinese computer users.
  
  
• A Netcraft study revealed, in march 2001, (29 + 3) % of the physical computers used to serve websites run Linux.
  Though the actual total number of physical computers used to serve websites is not told, this must also be a big number, so much users must use these computers to keep the websites up to date.
  
  
• The number of devices using Linux is growing.
  For example, many modem-like devices, Audio Video entertainment devices like TiVo, and a growing number of mobile phones run Linux. Users of devices could be called Linux users.

Another way of estimating the popularity of Linux is doing some google searches.
For february 2005, teoma and google added together gave the following number of hits*

OS	Hits
Linux + linspire	269 M
Win3.1/95/98/2000/ME	88 M
Win2003/Server	19 M
WinXP	33 M
WinNT	33 M
WinLonghorn	33 M
TOTAL WINDOWS	162 M
Solaris	27 M
*BSD	55 M
NetWare (Novell)	7 M
Mac (Os X)	6 M

Bash-Script can be downloaded, depends on the lynx browser to run.

So there is no doubt by now: Linux is the most talked about OS on the Net!
(Notify me if you try the search and the numbers diverge very much!)

Some ways not to estimate

Some measures are lower than others.

One in particular that is low is estimates based on the number of browsers identifying themselves as Linux. Problem with this kind of measurements is that many sites expect a version of Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape before you can use the site. So many people, using other browsers like Firefox, Mozilla or Opera, had to change the user agent settings faking they were using Internet Explorer or Netscape, to enter these sites
(Note: for Firefox, if you change to Internet Explorer, also the OS is set to Windows XP).
Not changing these settings again the Konqueror, Opera and other browsers are then counted as being Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape browsers.

One answer is that stats may be confusing - you can never tell what you measure unless you say how you measure it.

Another is simply that a lot of Linux users use a different OS for gaming / browsing - a few years ago, a quick peek at the Linux Counter, which is about as diehard Linux as they come, showed that more than 60% of those registering as Linux users used a Windows browser to do so.

Future

One possible conclusion is that the "zealotry" of Linux users is not quite so big as it's claimed..... check out the continuing browser evolution from my Webalizer statistics.

Still not satisfied? Well - there's only one thing to do. Get out there and work on getting better numbers! Please mail any new ways to get estimates to us!

Have fun!