From the Appbot's blog, "Dissecting The App Store Top Charts":

In my mind games have always dominated the App Store, both in downloads and revenue, but what is the truth?

This inspired me to dig into the US top 200 charts (free, paid and grossing) to check out how the categories and age of the apps compared. The data is a snapshot take on April 8 2015.

For me, the most interesting revelation was the make-up of paid apps:

  • 42% Games
  • 12% Photo and video
  • 11% Health and fitness
  • 6% Entertainment
  • 4% Each for Utilities, Business, Weather, Music
  • 3% Each for Reference, Education, Productivity

I think that's percentage by app, not any weight for cost. It's just the number of apps on the store. Still, hello telling.

Notice too what's fallen essentially completely out: In free apps, Social Networking is 12% of the pie. In paid, zippo in the 3% or above.

Of course, what'd be really useful would be how people buy, not what's on the shelf. There can be dozens of brands of cookies, but if 98% of folks are buying Oreos, I'm not sure I want to be in the fig newton market, if you get my meaning. I mean, it could just be that every new Objective-C homebrewer brews a game first, trying to be the next Flappy Clash Birds.

Labels: , ,