A month ago, Chitika Insights reported that Apple desktops running Mountain Lion (OS X 10.8) generated 3.2% of all Mac-based Web traffic based on traffic through the Chitika ad network (http://chitika.com/). Since Mountain Lion officially turned one month old last Saturday, Chitika Insights revisited this study to see how quickly Mac users were adopting the latest operating system now that the novelty has begun to wear.

To quantify this study, Chitika Insights compiled a month’s worth of Mac OS X Web traffic, which sampled hundreds of millions of desktop ad impressions. The team then calculated market share distribution between all versions of Mas OS X – both as a weekly average and a daily tally from the date of release until now.

Since the unprecedented traffic increase that occurred within the first two days post-release, Mountain Lion has been steadily clawing its way upwards, according to Chitika. The spike seen in the previous Mountain Lion study actually continued past the first 48 hours, plateauing at 5.65% on July 29th, a full four days post release.

Mountain Lion users represented an average of 9.61% of all Mac OS X traffic from Aug. 20-27 and the adoption rate has shown no signs of letting up, according to Chitika. By Aug. 27, Mountain Lion usage constituted 10.3% of all Mac-based desktop impressions seen over the extensive Chitika ad network.

Mountain Lion’s adoption rate is still on track to outperform its predecessor, OS X Lion, which took three months to reach 14% of total Mac OS X traffic. Mountain Lion has already surpassed the 10% mark after only a single month. It’s possible that Mountain Lion’s growth will stall slightly once the post-launch excitement dies down, but should its rate of growth continue, the new OS will exceed Lion’s mark within three weeks, notes Chitika.

"There are numerous potential reasons as to why Mountain Lion’s adoption rate has fared better than its predecessor thus far. Mountain Lion received widely positive reviews by critics upon release, namely for its vast array of new features which made it feel like a genuine upgrade," Chitika says. "On the other hand, Lion was criticized by many prominent bloggers for its lack of innovation and behaving too much like iOS. Mountain Lion’s success may even be a testament to the notion that users are adopting the newest software at a faster rate than ever, thanks to better distribution options. In any case, we’ll soon be able to confirm whether or not OS X Mountain Lion truly outperforms its sibling."