Web Technologies of the Year 2021

Posted by Matthias Gelbmann on 3 January 2022 in News, Advertising Networks, Amazon, Amazon Associates, Amazon CloudFront, CDNJS, Cloudflare, Cloudflare, Cloudflare Server, Content Delivery, Content Management, Data Centers, Debian, DigiCert Group, DigitalOcean, DNS Servers, Email Servers, Ensighten, Facebook, Fastly, Gmail, Google Ads, Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, GridPane, Hostinger, Hostinger, Hostinger, Hostinger, Hotjar, Java, JavaScript, JavaScript Libraries, JsDelivr, Let’s Encrypt, LinkedIn, Linux, LiteSpeed, Lodash, Meta Pixel, Microsoft, Microsoft Advertising, Newfold Digital Group, Node.js, Operating Systems, React, Reverse Proxies, Ruby, RunCloud, Sectigo, Server-side Languages, Shopify, Shopify, Social Widgets, SSL Certificate Authorities, Tag Managers, Tealium, Traffic Analysis Tools, Twitter/X, Ubuntu, Underscore, Unpkg, Web Hosting, Web Panels, Web Servers, Wix, Wix, WordPress

To identify the winners in the various web technology categories, we compared the number of sites using a technology on January 1st, 2021 with the corresponding number on January 1st, 2022. We use the difference of these numbers, rather than a percentage, because that would favor technologies with a tiny user base at the beginning of the year. As in all our surveys, we restrict the numbers to the top 10 million sites, see technology surveys for more details.

These are the technologies that gained most sites in 2021

Content Management System of the Year 2021

  WordPress  

Of course, WordPress again, one is tempted to say. WordPress is the fastest growing content management system for the 12th year in a row. 43.2% of the web uses WordPress. In 2021, they have added another 9.3% to their already very impressive user base. That is more than 1000 new WordPress sites within the top 10 million sites every day of the year. Shopify is the second-fastest growing CMS, just like last year. It is now used by 4.4% of the websites, up from 3.2% a year ago. The third ranked Wix has overtaken Joomla and Drupal in 2021, and it is together with Shopify a prime example of the trend towards hosted content management systems.

Server-side Programming Language of the Year 2021

  Ruby  

Ruby is the web programming language of the year for the fourth year is a row. Many of the new Ruby sites use Shopify, which is based Ruby on Rails. Second comes JavaScript, increasing its user base by an impressive 55% in 2021. Third-ranked Java saw ups and downs in usage numbers throughout the years, but had a very good 2021.

JavaScript Library of the Year 2021

  Underscore  

Underscore claims on their website to provide a whole mess of useful functional programming helpers. More and more people seem to like that mess very much. It is our JavaScript library of the year for the first time. Both, the second-ranked React and the third-ranked Lodash benefit from being used by the popular Wix website builder.

Web Server of the Year 2021

  Cloudflare Server  

Nginx had a big moment in May 2021 by becoming the most popular web server, overtaking Apache. However, other tools had even higher growth rates. The Cloudflare Server repeats last year's victory, based on the strong growth of the Cloudflare CDN service. LiteSpeed comes in second, same as last year, ahead of Node.js.

Web Panel of the Year 2021

  RunCloud  

This is a new category in our surveys. While Plesk and cPanel are the most popular competitors, it's RunCloud which saw the strongest growth in 2021, and is therefore our web panel of the year. GridPane is second, and no other web panel provider increased its popularity this year, therefore we don't award a third rank.

Operating System of the Year 2021

  Linux  

Linux is our operating system of the year for the first time. Linux has been growing fast in recent years too, but this year we saw a disproportionately high growth in Linux servers, that we cannot assign to a specific Linux distribution. The distributions that gained most websites where Debian and Ubuntu, taking the second and third rank.

Web Hosting Provider of the Year 2021

  Shopify  

Shopify defends its title in the web hosting category, by growing its hosted e-commerce platform faster than any dedicated hosting provider. Second is Hostinger, by increasing its market share from 0.4% to 1.2% in 2021. Wix, another hosted CMS provider comes in third.

Data Center Provider of the Year 2021

  Amazon  

Data center providers are a new category in our surveys. Amazon is not only the most popular provider, but also the fastest growing in 2021, and thus our first data center provider of the year. Just like in the web hosting category, Hostinger had a very successful year and comes in on the second rank. DigitalOcean is third.

Reverse Proxy Provider of the Year 2021

  Cloudflare  

Cloudflare is the reverse proxy provider of the year for the 6th time in a row. 19.4% of the websites use Cloudflare, up from 15.4% one year ago - a very impressive gain. Fastly and Amazon CloudFront come in second and third, same as last year.

DNS Server Provider of the Year 2021

  Cloudflare  

Cloudflare also defends its title as DNS server provider of the year by further expanding its lead in this category. Newfold Digital Group (formerly Endurance) is second, and Hostinger makes it into the top three also in this category.

Email Server Provider of the Year 2021

  Microsoft  

The growth rate of Microsoft and Gmail in the email server space were almost the same in 2021, with Microsoft just a little bit ahead, grabing the title from last year's winner Gmail. Hostinger comes in third in one more category.

SSL Certificate Authority of the Year 2021

  Let’s Encrypt  

Let’s Encrypt has been very successful in the last few years already, but they were mostly using IdenTrust as root certificate, which is what we count root certificates in our surveys. Now their own root certificate is established, which explains their strong growth in 2021, winning our title for the first time. Sectigo, which won the title twice when they were still called Comodo, is second, and DigiCert Group is third.

JavaScript Content Delivery Network of the Year 2021

  CDNJS  

The result in the JavaScript content delivery network category is exactly the same as in the last three years: CDNJS is the winner for the 6th time in a row. CDNJS replaced Google Hosted Libraries as the most popular JavaScript CDN in August 2021. jsDelivr is a close second, benefiting from acquiring RawGit. unpkg comes in third.

Traffic Analysis Tool of the Year 2021

  Google Analytics  

After having won 7 times in previous years, Google Analytics regains the title from Facebook Pixel, which are second-ranked this time. Hotjar is third, just like in the last two years.

Advertising Network of the Year 2021

  Google Ads  

Google has managed to further increase its dominance in the web advertising market, and is again the fastest growing ad network for the 8th time if we include DoubleClick and AdSense, which we counted as separate networks many years ago. Xandr, which is about to be acquired by Microsoft, saw the second-fastest growth rate in this market. Amazon Associates, a previous winner, ranks third this year.

Tag Manager of the Year 2021

  Google Tag Manager  

The tag manager market is completely dominated by the Google Tag Manager with an amazing 99.6% market share. It keeps growing, and it is our tag manager of the year for the 8th time in a row. The fastest growing competitors in tag management are Tealium and Ensighten.

Social Widget of the Year 2021

  Twitter  

Twitter became the most popular social widget in August 2021. It is our social widget of the year, after winning that title already in 2014 and 2015. Facebook is a close second, ahead of LinkedIn.

Congratulations to all the awardees for their extraordinary achievements in the last year.
 

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