Mobile browser statistics: JavaScript and CSS on the go?

Posted 2007-10-07 in Mobile Web by Johann.

Edit: There is now a newer blog post about mobile web statistics.

I tried to find out which popular mobile browsers support CSS and JavaScript.

Mobile browser list

Here are the top 11 mobile browsers.

Why 11? The last one is too interesting to pass up.

1. Mozilla/4.0 (PSP (PlayStation Portable); 2.00)

1032 requests.
Based on Access NetFront. Does basic CSS and JavaScript. Needs special linking for handheld style sheets.

2. Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.0; Google Wireless Transcoder;)

852 requests.
These are mobile phones connecting through Google’s Wireless Transcoder. This could be an education issue – apparently people don’t expect “regular” websites to work in their mobile browsers.

3. Opera/9.10 (Nintendo Wii; U; ; 1621; en)

390 requests.
Based on the desktop Opera browser. Great CSS and JavaScript support including AJAX.

4. Opera/8.01 (J2ME/MIDP; Opera Mini; en; U; ssr) UP.Link/6.3.1.13.0

292 requests.
An older Opera mini version. Basic CSS support, no JavaScript. Minor issues.

5. Opera/9.50 (J2ME/MIDP; Opera Mini/4.0.8993/58; U; en)

210 requests.
The latest version of Opera Mini. I haven’t tried it out yet but I doubt it does JavaScript.

6. Opera/8.01 (J2ME/MIDP; Opera Mini/3.1.7203/1710; en; U; ssr)

124 requests.
Yet another Opera Mini.

7. Mozilla/5.0 (Danger hiptop 2.4; U; AvantGo 3.2)

94 requests.
Requests both screen and handheld CSS as well as Java Script.

8. Mozilla/5.0 (Danger hiptop 3.3; U; AvantGo 3.2)

54 requests.
Identical requests to hiptop 2.4.

9. Mozilla/5.0 (PLAYSTATION 3; 1.00)

41 requests.
Also based on Access NetFront. Does basic CSS and Java Script. Linking CSS is also different.

10. Mozilla/5.0 (PDA; NF34PPC/1.0; like Gecko) NetFront/3.4

34 requests.
The latest NetFront version. Better CSS and Java Script support?

11. Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko)

12 requests.
The iPhone’s browser is based on Safari which does CSS and JavaScript (possibly very well).

This list was generated from the last four weeks of log files.

JavaScript

JavaScript for mobile browsers is still experimental. While half of the hits were made by browsers that support Java Script to some extent, relying on it probably can’t be recommended at this time. AJAX is clearly not recommended.

CSS

Support for the handheld media type in the mobile browsers listed here is surprisingly good however. Note I am not talking about what CSS properties are supported, just that linking works.

NetFront is the only browser that doesn’t request the handheld CSS media type and insists on screen.

IEMobile/Pocket Internet Explorer on Pocket PC/Smartphone/other PDAs and the Danger hiptop load all style sheets. The method described in linking CSS for handheld devices revisited should be used for these browsers.