Firefox the WebKit layout engine instead of Gecko, as with all other iOS web browsers. Firefox was created in 2002 under the codename "Phoenix" by the Mozilla community members who desired a standalone browser, rather than the Mozilla Application Suite bundle. During its beta phase, Firefox proved to be popular with its testers and was praised for its speed, security, and add-ons compared to Microsoft's then-dominant Internet Explorer 6. Firefox was released on November 9, 2004, and challenged Internet Explorer's dominance with 60 million downloads within nine months. Firefox is the spiritual successor of Netscape Navigator, as the Mozilla community was
Firefox 3.5 to support X BitMap images. Estimates of Firefox 3.5's global market share in February 2010 were around 15–20% and rose rapidly in July 2009 as users migrated from Firefox 3.0. From January 2010 it began to decline as users migrated to Firefox 3.6. Between mid-December 2009 and February 2010, Firefox 3.5 was the most popular browser (when counting individual browser versions) according to StatCounter, and was one of the top 3 browser versions according to Net Applications. Both milestones involved passing Internet Explorer 7, which previously held the No. 1 and No. 3 spots in popularity according to StatCounter and