Hotel Guest User Agent Data

I wrote a script that exposes browser and software platform data from hotels across the country. This data is very different from say: StatCounter or NetApplications estimates because they rely on getting their data from trackers on specific websites.

The data I pulled comes from guests getting redirected by Network Access Gateways at hotel hotspots and so user agents are tracked regardless of which site a Guest browses to. It feels like a pretty unique cross-section of what browsers and operating systems people are using while travelling.

I pulled just over 80,000 requests over a week long period and removed CaptiveNetworkSupport and other stay-alive requests that aren’t coming from real human users (iOS is constantly curling this page to see if an SSID gets the user online) .

As expected, Windows and Internet Explorer top the list by far. But Mac is close behind and iOS is by far the most popular mobile browser. Android doesn’t even make it on this list. Perhaps Android users tend to stay on 3G because their OS doesn’t so aggressively force them to connect to WiFi?

Here I’m surprised Windows XP is still so popular.

This puts the sad truth in perspective. Even while travelling, nearly half of people are using some version of Internet Explorer to browse the web.