Apple hits 500,000 app milestone
by Steven Mostyn - May 25 2011, 10:45
Up, up and away. Image: 148apps, Chomp and Chillingo.
Google’s Android Market certainly offers a well-stocked alternative for smartphone users not drawn inexorably towards the iPhone. However, when it comes to crunching the numbers, Apple’s bulging App Store remains the leading supplier of mobile software applications.
More pointedly, app-centric specialists 148apps, Chomp, and Chillingo have today released an infographic that shows the Apple store now boasts some 500,000 approved apps for users equipped with an iPhone, an iPad tablet or an iPod Touch handset.
Placing celebratory bunting aside for a moment, it’s worth noting that the actual amount of accessible apps presently crammed onto the App Store’s virtual shelves comes in at closer to 400,000—provided by an impressive 85,569 developers.
Further to hitting such a monumental milestone in App Store history, some 37 percent (approx. 148,000) of open applications are available for download without charge. And the average purchase price attached to fee-based downloads is a mere $3.64 USD.
The vast majority of App Store apps cover gaming (15 percent), with digital books, entertainment, and education platforms following close behind with 14 percent, 11 percent, and 8 percent coverage respectively.
By way of comparison, the Android Market currently offers 294,000 apps to those wielding mobile devices equipped with Google's popular operating system.
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