Steam On Linux Adoption Gaining, Overtaking Mac OS

A lot of things happen at the start of each month, and one of those that I look most forward to is being able to check out the updated hardware survey at Steam. It's especially interesting right now, because Windows 8 is only four months old, and the platform became official for Linux only a couple of weeks ago. Given it happened so recently, I think most might agree that the Linux aspect is a bit more interesting than the Windows 8 aspect at the moment.

In last month's survey (for January, 2013), Linux as a whole accounted for 1.27% of the total. This included both x86 and x86_64 versions. But, these numbers were from before the time Steam for Linux was official - so where do we stand today? At a cool 2.08%, that's where.

The bulk of the share belongs to the latest version of Ubuntu, 12.10 64-bit, with 0.71%. The 32-bit edition slots in second, with 0.38% of the share. Interestingly, Linux Mint gets a mention this month, with a share of 0.17%.

Considering the fact that the Linux userbase is but a mere drop in the bucket versus Windows, to score 2% just two weeks after the official Steam for Linux launch is pretty impressive. How does it compare to Mac OS X, a platform which has had a Steam client for close to three years? 3.07%.

Given the two-month trend we just experienced, it's reasonable to believe that next month, Linux could overtake Mac OS X as the second most-popular OS using the service.