The latest research from
Gartner indicates that, for the year 2009, only 16 million app sales were executed on mobile devices not bearing the infamous bitten apple logo. In reporting this data,
Ars Technica inadvertently conflates Apple's latest announcement of three billion apps
downloaded with the notion of three billion apps
sold and pegs the App Store's market share at a whopping 99.4 percent -- but more realistic calculations still show it to be somewhere in the vicinity of 97.5 percent. Going off estimates (obtained by
GigaOM) that a quarter of App Store downloads are paid-for apps, and taking a
rough figure of 2.5 billion downloads in 2009, leaves us with around 625 million app sales performed by Apple, which comfortably dwarfs all its competition. Considering the fact 18 months ago there wasn't even an App Store to speak of -- whereas today Cupertino is gobbling up the best part of $4.2 billion in annual mobile apps revenue -- maybe you can now understand why we're covering every tiny drip of info about that
mythical tablet.
posted January 19th 2010 2:47AM
@autopilot "So everytime someone downloads the free 'lite' version followed by the full version that counts as 2 unit sales?"
Even if that was the case, and the real number of downloads dropped from 3 billion to 1.5 billion... it's still a crazy amount of anything being downloaded.
@autopilot - of course. 2 downloads, counter +2;
@Michael Scrip - you know that quoting something verbatim that stands exactly above your post makes you look pretty douchy, right?
Dear Ballmer,
How's that 3% Marketshare taste?
Windows Mobile, Zune, and Bing OH MY!
Windows Mobile, Zune, and Bing OH MY!
Windows Mobile, Zune, and Bing OH MY!
Regards,
Steve Jobs Bunghole
@Wesscoast
Windows Mobile, Zune, Bing, Macintosh.
FTFY.
@Decoy
Yeah, that was my point. Get it? Genius?
Except the Mac is an incredibly profitable business. Something MS hasn't done since the 90's.
I just thought it was because you had nothing else to do with your lives. . .
I have a 32gb 3gs and have downloaded plenty of apps but I really wish I had waited and got an Android unit.
I will do next phone and I think that then (12-18 months) there will be a fair dint in these numbers from the Android store mainly in my humble opinion because there is more than ONE handset maker and more than one carrier. Or we will all go back to carrier pidgeons
Just my opinion.........
@madmac
Actually, for the year 2009 it would be around $625M if they are all $.99 apps, but some will be more so make it $650M to account for the odd few buying the navigation packages and other higher priced apps.
Thats using the 2.5 billion download number stated above and making 1/4 of them paid apps.
It would be nice if App developers just made their Apps web-based so that any phone or even computer could use their apps. But since Apple has created an App Store, where people BUY apps, these people are more likely to stick with Apple because of their investment in Apple-only Apps. argghh.
Really don't think you have to make any explanations as to your reporting habits.
As I scan down the list of articles yesterday and today I see three articles with Apple related content and many times that number of posts about non-Apple equipment. The number of Android articles exceeds the number of Apple related articles let alone iPhone articles.
This site is my number one choice for reading about concepts and new products due to the fact you post anything and everything and let me decide what is worth reading for myself.
I am a windows desktop and mobile user atm (Windows 7 & Samsung Omnia - Verizon) and have no Apple products, not even a iPod in our house, so it is not fanboy talk on my part.
The simple fact is the more popular something is the more it is going to make the news. Happens in everything from business to entertainment to national news. Take the who Brad and Anj. thing or the mom with the Octuplets or any number of other stories that get beaten into the ground for a year or more at a time before the next big thing comes along.
Right now in the technology news arena Apple and the iPhone are the big thing. It is the most popular smartphone platform atm ..not Android, not WebOS, Blackberry or Windows Mobile. I don't care if Nokia sells more smartphones than them worldwide, or that developers say that Android is where things are headed. It is still the iPhone that is the most POPULAR in the US and that is where the news coverage is going to be centered.
"whereas today Cupertino is gobbling up the best part of $4.2 billion in annual mobile apps revenue -- maybe you can now understand why we're covering every tiny drip of info about that mythical tablet. "
Because Windows 7 is selling so fast, and Windows OSs are on 90%+ of all machines, maybe now you can understand why we are covering that Windows Mobile 7? This is strange logic to start applying across the board, not that we expect you to.
Oddly, enough, you guys were expressing so much boredom in previous Apple tablet rumor filler posts only now to show that you were doing it due to App store downloads? Ok...
#2 How can you measure what has been downloaded for other platforms when they all dont use central app stores?
@LAY
Except of course Windows 7 was covered extensively by them and it got a lot of media coverage as well.
As a Win 7 user myself I think it's the best OS to date that MS has put out. And I was a Vista apologist for the longest time as well.
However that being said MS news doesn't draw in viewers or commentators like Apple news...that's the bottom line.
As someone earlier points out there are over 400 comments in the post about the upcoming Apple event. That will never happen for your precious android os.
Again I don't know why you stick around. It truly annoys and perplexes me...why would you visit a website that you hate because you think it's biased one way or the other. Wouldn't simple logic be to visit ANOTHER tech website?
@TheRogueFFAngel
"As someone earlier points out there are over 400 comments in the post about the upcoming Apple event. That will never happen for your precious android os."
My "precious android os'? I dont even have an Android device. Why would you make such a stupid statement like that?
"Again I don't know why you stick around. It truly annoys and perplexes me...why would you visit a website that you hate because you think it's biased one way or the other."
Again you keep saying I "hate" this site, yet like I asked before, FURNISH ME A QUOTE WHERE I SAID I HATE THIS SITE. When they do it right, the site is the best, when they try to be Gizmodo, they look foolish.
I pointed out something that made no sense. Engadget that has said they were bored with the Apple tablet rumors, now say because of App store downloads, that it's obvious why they were covering the "mythical" tablet.
That makes no logical sense.
But pointing that out is now a thought crime too?
@LAY
Windows and Windows Mobile are... not related in any way.
Thank god, Windows users have a choice of a ton of very cool smartphones to choose from, so MS's evil monopoly does not lock them to the turd that is Windows Mobile.
In other words, there is no MS Monopoly for Winmo, so no one will touch it.
Is this just in the US? Or do they not include everything?
Because I saw an article last year somewhere (I've been trying to google for it), which had the numbers for all those mobile content dealers that sells wallpapers, ringtones, java-games, and shit like that.
And it absolutely dwarfed any numbers yet from the Apple App Store.
I don't think this is anything to be proud of when you take a close look at what is being downloaded or bought.
Hahaha go Apple! Suck it Wintards.
I'm not sure I believe those numbers at face value, but hell, even if the real numbers are only half that it's still extremely impressive.
@Chefgon
Ha. What a FoxNews statement.
"Obama's probably a terrorist, and Universal Health Care will probably turn us into Soviet Russia, but even if, in the remote possibility that it doesnt, it might be a moot point because.... did you know he's not even an American?.. More on this after the break"
@madmac
The last quarter that they reported they did over $9 billion in sales, even deferring the iPhone revenue like they do for their GAAP reasoning, or $12 billion for the quarter without the deferred revenue.
If you have a break down of all that income to show where $650 million is missing from the statement please reference it. I did a search for the last financial statement and all the sites I found it on did not break it down into product lines at all.
But I really don't see why you would a problem with even $1 billion of that $9-12 billion being from that app store let alone $600 million.
@madmac
Actually I did find a semi-breakdown on the yearly report at Apple and I would say that the $4 billion in listed income from iTunes would more than cover it if that covers the app store also, or the $6 billion in iPhone related sales if they put it there.
Also remember that for the example in the article they were estimating 625 million of the apps being paid apps. My above statement that it would translate to $650 million in cash was incorrect as they only recieve a portion of that after paying the developer his share of the sale. So maybe make that $500 million for the last quarter with each previous quarter going down from there. So for the entire year they would have maybe $1.7 billion out of $36 billion being from the app store. I find that very easy to believe.
Glad I'm not part of that statistic, most of my Android apps are free! Rock on Android!
Gartner's figures include ALL apps distributed via every available app store on all platforms. Apple's count likewise includes every app distributed. Ergo, 2.5 / 2.516 * 100 = 99.4%.
@foresmac
Well no. Every available manufacturer controlled app store. None of which even existed before iPhone. There are about gazillion others though. That is why the stats look all Apple. I can assure you I have spent loads of money on apps before iPhone though.
That is why this looks really silly. There is something like 3 billion phones on this planet, these days almost all of them support 3rd party apps. Do you really buy the "only iPhone users have apps." argument?
Ergo, this statistic isn't very accurate.
The genes that are driving our love for Apple products are the same or in the same category as those that have been selected by the evolution of men from monkeys. Men strive for innovation and technological advance, monkeys don't. To deny or suppress your admiration for Apple is to take away the basic characteristics that make you human. It's a futile process, as you are but a vessel for the genes within.
@Hydraulics
Apple tried to push web based apps when the iphone made it's debut and were heavily criticized for it. Providing an SDK for developers and a link to millions of itunes music customers was a brilliant play.
People used to spend insane amounts of money on custom ring tones. A fart app is a bargain in comparison.
OK, lets stick to the facts here readers and Engadget writers.
According to Apple's 2009 10K, app store sales are for some reason buried in the category "Other music related products and services" which recorded $4bn in sales in Apples FY09.
Growth of 21% in this category was attributed to "increased net sales of third-party digital content and applications from the iTunes Store". Note that it differentiates the itunes store from the App store and expects strong growth to continue in this category due to BOTH itunes store sales and App store sales (thus confirming its inclusion in this category). One can infer from all this that App store sales did not contribute as much to the 21% growth to $4bn (despite the fact that app store sales during FY08 would have been tiny) as itunes sales.
If I am misinterpreting Apple's (admitedly somewhat confusing) semantics and it does consider App store sales as a subset of itunes sales, then the $696m increase in sales would represent the upper limit of App store sales. Apple's financial year runs to 26th Sept so any App store sales in FY08 would have been confined to the first 2-3 months after the App store's launch and therefore somewhat limited. Given that the $696m increase will also include itunes music, TV and movie sales, which lets face it are not going to be small, then the App store part of this is likely to be small.
Either way, it looks like app store sales would be in the very low hundreds of millions of dollars.
BTW, this is all in the section "Fiscal Year 2009 versus 2008"