We've previously generated statistics of IRC client versions in use on QuakeNet through the use of a network-wide CTCP VERSION request.

In 2002, Froo wrote a column on the results, and in 2004, there was a newspost

The "top 15" client version responses on QuakeNet when the CTCP VERSION was issued are as follows:

  • 19942 mIRC v6.21 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 11598 mIRC v6.17 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 8502 mIRC v6.16 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 7775 mIRC v6.3 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 6321 NoNameScript 4.03
  • 5449 NoNameScript 4.1
  • 5083 irssi v0.8.10 - running on Linux i686
  • 4268 mIRC v6.2 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 2394 NoNameScript 3.81
  • 1564 irssi v0.8.11 - running on Linux i686
  • 1402 mIRC v6.03 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 1268 Gamers.IRC 5.10 Build 070701
  • 1170 mIRC v6.12 Khaled Mardam-Bey
  • 1150 Trillian
  • 1143 mIRC v6.14 Khaled Mardam-Bey NOTE: As users may hide or customise the CTCP Version Response, the figures generated above do not indicate the exact number of users running a particular script or irc client.

There are a number of client/scripts that fall outside the statistics above - we may make detailed statistics available in future for these scripts/clients. For example in 16th Place is nbs-irc 2.36 with 971 users