Opera has the record of being the most secure browser, while last time the numbers showed that a large number of users actually hasn't upgraded to the latest release in order to be secure. In fact Firefox users are far more faithful in updating their release than any other web browser user.

The strenght in Firefox users keeping their release up to date is the automatic update system, which Opera misses currently. But that's not everything; especially corporate and educational environments are slow in taking major release steps, a thing Opera Software does not take into account. Slow adoption is caused by being in a large environment where big changes can have high impacts, both on the users as well as financial. That's why most companies just wait and see how the next release stabilizes and is ready for their stable production environment. In order to get large communities, such as companies, to upgrade eventually support has to end for a major release. For Firefox 1.5 users that means pretty soon now, as 1.5.0.12 will be the last one before they're forced to use Firefox 2.0.0.x. For Opera users this doesn't apply as each major release means that every Opera user most upgrade.

Some Opera facts:

• Opera 9.21 was released on 21/05/2007, while Opera 8.54 was released on 05/04/2006.
• Opera 9.0 was released on 20/06/2006, while Opera 8.0 was released on 19/04/2005.
• The first security fix that was not backported in Opera 8.5x was in 9.02 on 21/09/2006.
• In one year Opera released 6 versions in the Opera 9.x series.
• About 11.96% did not upgrade to the latest Opera 9 release.

Some Firefox facts:

• Firefox 2.0.0.3 was released on 20/03/2007, and Firefox 1.5.0.11 was released on 20/03/2007.
• Firefox 2.0.0.0 was released on 24/10/2006, and Firefox 1.5.0.0 was released on 08/12/2005.
• The first security release that was not backported in Firefox 1.5.0.x will be after the Firefox 2.0.0.4, which is not yet released.
• In one year Firefox released 9 versions; 4 in the Firefox 2.0.0.x series, 9 in the Firefox 1.5.0.x series of which 4 coincide with Firefox 2.
• Only 5.19% did not upgrade to the latest Firefox 2 release.

In conclusion the version releases between Firefox and Opera is hard to compare, since Opera creates in between releases with added features, such as Opera 9.10 (Fraud Protection) and Opera 9.20 (Speed Dial). On the other hand Firefox' policy of releases only consists of security and stability fixes. It can be said that Opera needed less patching than Firefox, which is in favor for deployment in large communities. However automatic updating is a pain for Opera as of yet (hopefully not with Kestrel or Peregrine) as each release means a full download and manual installation. There was also no choice between sticking to Opera 8.5x for companies when Opera 9.xx introduced security fixes, as any overlap didn't exist. Thus it really means for large communities, each release is a must upgrade version, and sticking to a more stable or known branch is not possible. If or when these points get addressed by Opera it might trigger a more solid infestation of large communities, such as companies and universities. And getting there, means getting more end users as well, don't you use software you use at work, and vice versa? For now I can only advise companies and universities to use Firefox, as it's the only sane software solution for deployment in large networks instead of Internet Explorer.

What I'm curious about is what keeps people from upgrading to the latest release, even if Opera notifies of a new version?