Does anyone actually know how many percent of people have Ubuntu or any Linux distro?

[gymophett]

I have no clue. I don't guess they can really give an exact estimate at all.
But I would say, somewhat 40,000,000 or 50,000,000 world wide?
I'm clueless :/

[blastus]

Give or take 1%...

Usage share of desktop operating systems (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems)

[binbash]

%1 to %3

[amauk]

Usage share stats are dodgy at best

Those that tout "market share" are based on sales of computers pre-installed with a certain OS
Sales are easy to record and monitor

They do not account for Windows machines wiped and reloaded with a different OS
and the vast majority of Linux installs are not pre-installed by an OEM

Those that monitor a browser's user-agent string are also inaccurate
They typically monitor certain "types" of sites, and you get skewed results
(w3schools is a prime example here)

According to Canonical, there's 10 million unique IPs that hit the repos for updates.
I believe Novell & RedHat also publish stats on how many IPs hit their servers for updates

Of course, these stats are also inaccurate, as there could be 100 machines behind one IP

There just isn't a reliable way to track users
(a lot of people probably don't want to be tracked)

If I had to guess (I have nothing to back this up)
I'd say, 3-5% of desktop machines run Linux
50-60% of servers run Linux

[cmay]

i read an article in a computer magazine a while ago that roughly 40 % of all students in germany uses linux. it was an article about the linux operative coming forward in usage and i think its about six month or so since i read it. i choose to believe in this article.

i wish i could find out how many actually uses linux becouse in denmark where i live it seems like no one does and when you drive across the border then 40 % of the youht is learning by using linux machines and in other countries like france there is coverments using linux which must mean there is more than just 1% users worldwide.

[conehead77]

... roughly 40 % of all students in germany uses linux.
I highly doubt that as i am a student in Germany and not even in my CS courses Linux comes close to 40%, let alone all the other students.
I would really like to see the article you mentioned, there must be a quirk somewhere. Linux here in Germany is just as exotic as in any other country.

[cmay]

I highly doubt that as i am a student in Germany and not even in my CS courses Linux comes close to 40%, let alone all the other students.
I would really like to see the article you mentioned, there must be a quirk somewhere. Linux here in Germany is just as exotic as in any other country.

its a danish computer magazine i read it in. i copied it and i think its from "alt om data" or something like that. i found it on the library.

i wonder where they get the figures from myself but in the end its almost impossible to really find out how many there is using linux since there is no statistics based on hard cold facts and maybe the article was pointing out a figure based on statistics from one school .
sad if its not true it would mean a whole lot if it really was true.

[BuffaloX]

According to Canonical, there's 10 million unique IPs that hit the repos for updates.


http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm

Number of computers on the Internet: 1,574,313,184

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8

Linux Usage according to Net Applications: 0.83%

1,574,313,184 x 0.83% = 13,066,799

If Ubuntu has 10 mill. unique IPs alone, Those IPs would be for more than 10 mill. users. Probably 12-15 million, Ubuntu is estimated to have about 40-50% of Linux desktops.
The number of Linux Desktop users would then be at least 25 mill or 1.6 %

Provided Ubuntu usage and Ubuntu share and world user numbers are reliable.

[gymophett]

From the info I've read. I'd have to say about 2.2%