Data from e-commerce technology platform Monetate paints a sunny picture of the future of Apple’s Safari browser.  The company released data Friday morning that shows that Apple’s Safari is the fastest growing browser among e-commerce sites. 

Monetate gathered the info from among the 100+ e-commerce sites on its platform, which includes customers like Best Buy, Comcast, Freshpair.com, Godiva, Jockey, and more.  Peering into the shopping habits of Web users who visit those sites, Monetate found that mobile browsing is rapidly ground, with Mobile Safari growing in popularity to account for 11.12% of the market in Q1 2012.  That’s up from 5.84% in Q1 2011.

And guess who’s losing ground to Apple: none other than Internet Explorer.  Surprised?  No?  Me neither.

Of course, Explorer is still the reigning champion among Web browsers with 42.35% of the market.  But that’s down from 53.45% the previous year.  And on the weekends, Explorer loses even more market share, dropping to 35.82% of the market while Mobile Safari claims 16.75%.

Among the wider Web in general, StatCounter puts Chrome at the top of the list with 32.43% of the market as of May 2012, while Internet Explorer comes in second with 32.12%, and Mobile Safari doesn’t even make a blip on the radar.  But Monetate’s data was culled exclusively from its own customers and it focuses entirely on e-commerce, so that’s an important distinction to make.  Its data isn’t suggesting that Mobile Safari is on its way to eclipse Internet Explorer as the top browser of all time (some day it might—who knows?). 

Rather, Mobile Safari is proving to be a rising star in the e-commerce world, which points to the rising popularity of mobile commerce.  That would, of course, make sense when you consider the weekend numbers.  Who wants to get on their computer on the weekend?  It’s way easier to eat your cereal and watch your Saturday morning cartoons while shopping on your phone.

Check out the infographic below for more deets.

Monetate Marketing Infographics