Netscape released Netscape Navigator, the widely used web browser introduced in 1994.
The company began as Mosaic Communications, founded by Jim Clark and Marc Andreessen, who had been involved with the influential NCSA Mosaic project. Its first browser was initially called Mosaic Netscape, but a naming dispute led to the Navigator name. Netscape Navigator 1.0 followed in December 1994, after earlier beta releases.
Navigator became the dominant browser of the mid-1990s and helped make the World Wide Web accessible to ordinary computer users. It supported features that became central to web browsing, including images displayed with text, cookies, JavaScript, and frames. The browser’s success helped drive the first major browser war.
Mosaic is a common source of confusion: it preceded Navigator and helped popularize graphical web browsing. Microsoft’s Internet Explorer later overtook Netscape, aided by its inclusion with Windows, and Netscape’s browser line eventually disappeared from mainstream use.