Google’s (NSDQ: GOOG) new Chrome web browser is already gaining respectable traction, just a week after its unveiling. Telegraph.co.uk communities editor Shane Richmond reports 1.8 percent of all visits to the news site were with Chrome yesterday, and Last.fm told me hits from the browser have already surpassed those from Opera.

Those numbers might seem small, but consider the advantages Internet Explorer has through pre-bundling, and consider that Firefox is the top choice for many of Chrome’s target market. The figures are also consistent - StatCounter, which monitors worldwide hits, last week pegged Chrome share at 1.10 percent.

IE had 73.81 percent of the global browser market share in Q2, Firefox 18.43 percent, Safari 6.14 percent and Opera 0.71 percent, according to NetApplications. In Europe, it’s IE on 67.5 percent, Firefox on 27 percent, Opera 3.1 percent and Safari 1.8 percent, according to XiTi.

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