Mobile App Market To Double, Free Apps Lead The Way
Peter Suciu for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online
This year there will be more than six apps downloaded per person in the world. According to new research from Gartner, smartphone users will download in excess of 45.6 billion apps in 2012, nearly twice the number of apps that were downloaded just last year.
Apple, Google and Microsoft will continue to dominate the global app market, with Apple’s iOS accounting for the largest share of downloads in 2012. Apple will account for 21 billion app downloads, a 74 percent increase from the previous year.
But Apple’s dominance will face greater competition from its rivals as well as from new emerging players in the app arena including Facebook and Amazon.
“Amazon has appealed to users with its strong brand, global presence and a good selection of high-quality content while Facebook’s recently launched App Center — supporting both mobile devices and desktops — will become a powerful competitor due to its strong brand and leading position in social networking and gaming,” said Sandy Shen, Gartner’s research director in a statement.
Gartner further estimates that the number will only increase, and that by 2016 there will be more than 300 billion app downloads annually, essentially 10 times the amount of downloads from 2011.
Free apps also continue to dominant the download market, with 89 percent of all downloads this year falling into the free category. In fact, according to Gartner, only 5 billion of the 45.6 billion apps expected to be downloaded in 2012 will be paid apps.
“In terms of the apps that consumers are buying, 90 percent of the paid-for downloads cost less than $3 each,” Shen emphasized. “Similar to free apps, lower-priced apps will drive the majority of downloads. Apps between 99 cents and $2.99 will account for 87.5 percent of paid-for downloads in 2012, and 96 percent by 2016.”
So where is the revenue going to come from? According to Gartner, in-app payments will make up 41 of app store revenue. The other revenue stream could be with “in-app” purchasing, with reportedly could open the door to a recurring form of revenue in-take for developers. Gartner expects apps offering in-app options to climb from just five percent last year to 30 percent over the next four years.
This rise in app downloads could actually surpass Gartner’s estimates, as NPD Group’s DisplaySearch new forecasts predicted smartphone shipments to reach 567 million in 2012, and potentially double by 2016. This report on Wednesday was released in advance of the expected announcement of the iPhone 5, which will likely see the latest surge in mobile phone sales.
The app explosion won’t be limited to the North America or Western Europe, as predictions suggest that China could be a leading market for apps. And these could come from non-traditional delivery methods. China has seen a significant boom of independent app stores thanks to the lack of Google Play in the still tightly-controlled Asian nation. New entrants to the market could deepen these relationships with customers and even capture some of the market.
While Apple doesn’t run those “there’s an app for that” commercials any more, in the future it does very much look like worldwide there could be an app for just about anything.
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2012-09-12 13:57:22
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