Web Technologies of the Year 2024

Posted by Matthias Gelbmann on 2 January 2025 in News, Actalis, Advertising Networks, AlmaLinux, Amazon CloudFront, Cloudflare, Cloudflare Server, Content Delivery, Content Management, CSS Frameworks, Data Centers, DDoS-Guard, DNS Servers, Elementor, Email Servers, Equativ, Exponential, Full Circle Studies, GlobalSign, Google, Hostinger, Hostinger, Hostinger, Hostinger, JavaScript, JavaScript Libraries, JsDelivr, Let’s Encrypt, Linux, LiteSpeed, Lodash, Mastodon, Matomo Tag Manager, Navegg, Node.js, Operating Systems, Polyfill.io, React, Reverse Proxies, Ruby, Scala, Server-side Languages, Shopify, Snowplow, Social Widgets, Spectre, SSL Certificate Authorities, Tag Managers, Tailwind, Team.blue, Team.blue, Team.blue, Team.blue, Telegram, TinyCP, Traffic Analysis Tools, UIkit, United Internet, Unpkg, Web Hosting, Web Panels, Web Servers, WhatsApp, Wix, Wix, Wix, WPTangTocOLS

To identify the winners in the various web technology categories, we compared the number of sites using a technology on January 1st, 2024 with the corresponding number on January 1st, 2025. 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 focus on the relevant web, see technology surveys for more details.

These are the technologies that gained most sites in 2024

Content Management Tool of the Year 2024

  Elementor  

Elementor, a website builder based on WordPress could repeat its victory from last year by increasing its market share from 9.5% to an impressive 11.7%. Last years title caused quite a bit of discussion, as people pointed out that Elementor is merely a WordPress plugin and should not be counted as CMS. At W3Techs, we use a most generous definition of CMS: it is any tool that may be used to manage the content of a website. For example, editors, that support generating HTML pages are often used to build websites, so we include them as CMS, although, many people would use a more restricted definition of that term. We see Elementor as website builder in competition with other website builders, that happen to be WordPress-based or not. As such, we think it makes sense to measure and compare the market shares of these tools. To avoid more confusion, we called it Content Management Tool of the Year.

A former winner, Wix, comes second this year. Shopify comes in third, same as last year.

Server-side Programming Language of the Year 2024

  JavaScript  

JavaScript is the web programming language of the year for the second time in a row. It is now used by 4% of all websites, up from 3.1% one year ago. Second ranked Scala benefits from its use at Wix, just like third-ranked Ruby benefits by its use at Shopify and other popular systems.

JavaScript Library of the Year 2024

  React  

React is our JavaScript library of the year for the first time, now used by 4.7% of all websites. Lodash as second is perhaps a bit of a surprise, and so is Polyfill.io as third.

CSS Framework of the Year 2024

  Tailwind  

Tailwind is not the most popular framework (that is Bootstrap by a long shot), but it is the one that gained most users for the second time in a row. The front-end framework UIkit is second in this category, like last year. Third rank goes to Spectre.

Web Server of the Year 2024

  Cloudflare Server  

Cloudflare Server, the server technology used by the popular Cloudflare CDN, is the web server of the year for the third time after winning also in 2020 and 2021. LiteSpeed, last years winner, comes in second this year. Node.js is third, which is the same rank as the last three years.

Web Panel of the Year 2024

  WPTangTocOLS  

WPTangTocOLS, a Vietnamese web server administration tool, is certainly a niche player in that category, but growing faster than any other competitor in 2024. TinyCP, a lightweight Linux control panel with a modes market share, but also growing and ranking second. No other web panel saw a market share increase last year, therefore we don't award a third rank.

Operating System of the Year 2024

  Linux  

Linux is our operating system of the year for the second time after 2021. We saw a disproportionately high growth in Linux servers, that we cannot assign to a specific Linux distribution, therefore the individual Linux distributions score lower. AlmaLinux is actually the only distribution that saw a market share increase, and thus comes in second.

Web Hosting Provider of the Year 2024

  Hostinger  

Hostinger increased its market share from 2% to 3.4% in 2024, which makes it the web hosting provider of the year, defending the title from last year in an impressive way. Wix, the second in the CMS category, is also second in the web hosting category. team.blue comes in third, mostly due to acquisitions, increasing its ever-growing portfolio of web companies.

Data Center Provider of the Year 2024

  Hostinger  

Hostinger also repeats its last years victory in the data center category. Google comes in second this time, and team.blue finishes third also among data center providers.

Reverse Proxy Provider of the Year 2024

  Cloudflare  

Cloudflare is the reverse proxy provider of the year for the 8th time in the last 9 years. DDoS-Guard is second with a consistent growth in the last year, while Amazon CloudFront repeats the third rank from last year.

DNS Server Provider of the Year 2024

  Hostinger  

Hostinger is again our DNS server provider of the year. team.blue and Wix are in the top three in one more of our categories.

Email Server Provider of the Year 2024

  Hostinger  

Hostinger not only wins the email server provider category for the second time, they thereby also repeat the grand slam with this 4th title in 2024, as they did already in 2023. team.blue as second once more, and United Internet is third just like last year.

SSL Certificate Authority of the Year 2024

  Let’s Encrypt  

Let’s Encrypt is now by far the most used SSL certificate authority, after an impressive growth to 59.5% of all websites. The popularity of Let’s Encrypt is, of course, nothing new, but this year their use of IdenTrust as root certificate expired, and root certificates is what we measure in our surveys. GlobalSign also saw a strong growth and comes in second, after winning last year. The Italian provider Actalis comes in third.

JavaScript Content Delivery Network of the Year 2024

  jsDelivr  

jsDelivr is our JavaScript content delivery network of the year for the third year in a row. unpkg is second, after finishing in the top three many times before. No other competitor increased its usage in 2024.

Traffic Analysis Tool of the Year 2024

  Snowplow  

Snowplow is the traffic analysis tool of the year, used by 1.1% of all websites, up from 0.9% one year ago. None of the top providers could increase their market share last year, therefore the second-ranked Navegg and the third-ranked Full Circle Studies can also be considered growing niche players.

Advertising Network of the Year 2024

  Equativ  

Equativ is the advertising network of the year, after almost doubling its market share in the last year. Google, the gorilla in that space, is still by far the most popular network, but decreased a bit in 2024. Exponential is second in that category.

Tag Manager of the Year 2024

  Matomo Tag Manager  

Matomo Tag Manager is the tag manager of the year for the first time, dethroning Google Tag Manager after 10 years. Google lost a bit of its users in 2024, and so did all other tag managers, therefore only Matomo is awarded this year.

Social Widget of the Year 2024

  WhatsApp  

The two fastest growing social widget providers are messengers, and actually the same ones as last year: WhatsApp is first, Telegram is second. The social media network Mastodon is third. Bluesky and Threads were added to our surveys only during 2024, so there will be more competition next year.

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

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