

Android App Revenue Only 7% of iOS Revenue? Not So Fast - nextparadigms
http://www.androidauthority.com/android-app-revenue-only-7-of-ios-revenue-not-so-fast-34241/

======
maxklein
I have run endless tests comparing Android revenue to iOS revenue. It's
_pretty_ difficult to make money from Android with the same apps. Either with
Ads or Paid - the Android version of the exact same app gets less downloaded
(even if free), the revenue from Ads dies out quicker and if it's paid, it
will get bought much, much less.

I believe the core problem is that there is no clear discovery mechanism. With
iOS people use iTunes to sync. They open the app store and can try to discover
new and unknown apps that happen to be in the charts. The same does not exist
in Android. New apps don't get discovered.

Almost all apps in Android making money are externally marketed or viral.
Making an app for android is like making a website - nobody will come unless
you do something else. iOS however, does the marketing for you.

~~~
arnorhs
That's a very good point. A few other points:

\- Anecdotally, some (most?) of the "normal users" (non techies) I have seen
use their android, don't have their Google account set up on the device. I
would find it very interesting to know what percentage of people actually end
up doing that, because on Android it's optional.

\- If you don't have your Google account set up on your phone, you can't
access the marketplace and some people don't understand how that works and
what the marketplace has got to do with their Google account. Normal users
associate their phone with their cell provider and don't even realize that
Android is made by Google, etc.

I simply think that not that many people are installing and setting up apps on
their phones.

This will probably change in the future. Ironically, this is very similar to
the Mac vs PC wars in the 90s, but my belief is that Android will be the
dominant player in a few years and even though, the market is small (so far),
that that will change a lot.

Besides.. having a smaller piece of a bigger pie seems like worthwhile in the
long run.

~~~
mwidarto
I was under the impression that Ice Cream Sandwich will require user to enter
the credit card and associate it with their gmail account to activate the
device? Is that true? I remember reading something about this.

~~~
ugh
That … seems stupid? And I don’t really think that can be true.

I don’t even have a credit card (like many Europeans I only have a bank card)
and I’m also not enthusiastic about giving my payment information for just
using something or even just looking around.

~~~
mwidarto
I found the article that I was referring too. It's not required but there will
be prompt for it.

[http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/17/ice-cream-sandwich-
prompts-...](http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/17/ice-cream-sandwich-prompts-
users-to-join-google-enter-credit-card-information/)

------
betterth
This is nothing more than an unsourced fanboy response to a poorly created
article.

This guy seems to be endlessly harping on Android market share as if having
the most users will trick Android developers into forgetting that a much
smaller slice of a soon-to-be-larger pie actually is willing to pay for your
apps...

I get his argument that a more fair comparison would include Google Ad revenue
/ iAd revenue, instead of just app sales.

But the only party stopping that comparison here is really Google. They're
super tight lipped about the performance of their app store.

And it doesn't take a wild guess to wonder why.

~~~
tintin
_"But the only party stopping that comparison here is really Google."_ When
Google would release the stats, would you believe them?

There are a lot of stories about comparisons lately. I've seen a lot on HN and
here is one from Spacetime Studios (Pocket Legends):
<http://blogs.computerworld.com/17941/android_ios_app_profit> I think it's a
fair comparison. The game got very good reviews on both platforms.

But I also like the last quote: _"In some ways, it's kind of like the wild,
wild West"_ It's a new area and maybe it's too soon to make any meaningful
conclusions.

------
BrandonMTurner
For what its worth, this data might play a role in debate but doesn't provide
proof either way:

Our app is #8 in our category in the App Store and #13 in for the category in
the Android Marketplace. It is free and has no advertisements; only available
in US / Canada markets for both. We only get about ~1250 downloads a day on
Android and about ~3500 downloads a day on iOS.

With that skew in raw downloads combined with a variance of stereotypical
buying habits on each platform it is easy to see a way where iOS revenues
could outweigh Android revenues by a lot.

From our standpoint, at our scale, advertisements are almost worthless to the
amount it would hurt our brand. No agency, in Google itself, has shown us
revenue predictions that make our mouth water. We have also experimented with
a few direct placements (heavily target to our audience, and we did the design
work of the advertisements ourselves) but will likely not continue with that
in the future because of how bad they perform.

~~~
mattmanser
But you're using the app as a hook to get them to purchase something else
right or why bother? Or are you saying that loseit has no monetization
strategy?

Because I would have thought that making money out of a weight loss app should
be easy. You're talking about a market that will pay silly amounts just for
the idea of being thin. That you see people advertising all the time for
products to solve the problem because there's so much money in it.

~~~
BrandonMTurner
Right now we make very little money from the advertisements and / or products
we sell (We sell Fitbits, Withings scales, our book, tshirts). We have a
strategy that we have not executed on yet but have been heads down working on
for the last few months.

You might be surprised by the buying behaviors of "Do-It-Yourself" weight loss
users compared to the rest of the industry. Much of users come from Weight
Watchers because they don't want to pay anymore. Moreover, no one goes to WW
thinking they are going to get anything for free, where 100% of users come to
us thinking they will not be spending a penny. This is something we will work
and try to rite the ship as we execute our plans. Once we do that, we will
have the other half of the data that I mentioned (in my original comment)
about which one brings in more money. As of right now, Lose It! is free and we
lose money as we build our platform and brand.

------
yardie
If you don't like the other guys numbers back them up with your own. Don't
just go _nuh uh_. From the post, Android is at 55% market and 1:1 installed
base with iOS so.... nothing.

He just doesn't like that iOS had a 1 year headstart on Android and had 3
months longer to get App store sales (july-september).

------
coob
We sell the same apps on Android and iOS.

Android revenue is 5% of iOS revenue.

~~~
bryanlarsen
1) Are your placement & review scores on both app stores comparable?

2) Do you have any data on paid versus free/ad-supported apps?

~~~
ashishgandhi
1) If it's the same app (like the OP says) this is irrelevant. Even if it
isn't positioned high on the Android store - doesn't matter. For the OP if he
makes the app that he makes - iOS makes him money.

2) What kind of data? Data for his app? OP says he _sells_ on both platforms.
Some of us may not like the idea of ads on our apps (somewhat like some of us
don't like ads on our personal sites). But you may be correct in suggesting
ads work better on Android than paid apps.

~~~
jsnell
Of course the rating and chart position are relevant!

If you want to deduce something from an anecdote like this, these details are
absolutely critical. Otherwise you can't distinguish between the performance
difference being due to something random (maybe app got featured in one of the
stores, causing a positive feedback cycle via the charts), something specific
to the app (maybe the app was ported badly to one of the platforms), or
something that applies to a wide range of similar apps (maybe the users on one
platform just never buy anything).

If you find out that the app is #10 on the relevant list in one store and
#1000 on the other, one of the first two options seems a lot more likely than
the third one. If it has great ratings in one store and mediocre ones in the
other, that's rather suggestive of the second option, etc.

You say that for the OP only the amount of money he's making matters. Maybe
that's true for this single app, but it's not true when making the platform
choice any future apps. For those decisions, it's critical to have more
understanding of why the app performed badly on Android.

~~~
ashishgandhi
OP says apps (plural). Your whole argument is based on the probability that
one single app was a an outlier.

~~~
jsnell
I'm arguing nothing about the particular case. My issue is with your assertion
that the only the amount of money the app (your singular) makes is relevant.

------
idspispopd
The author is hopeful at best, even to concede each single tenuous argument
made, the article still doesn't make a convincing story. To consider even the
most simple counter points makes the article entirely feeble. (Does the author
believe ad-supported apps are unique to the marketplace?)

iOS's high revenue isn't chance: The iOS store is a stronger performer due to
not only a better demographic positioning, but it's an extension of the worlds
largest music store, it's a longer-term cultivation, it's run by a company
with very-high consumer trust, apple seed programs and provide continuous
incentives for developers, apple's yields massive advertising and events
programs and apple's incredibly high penetration due to inclusion with iTunes
and installation on all iOS devices, are each very strong reasons on it's own.

Meanwhile, those factors do make it a popular choice for developers who are
wanting mainstream consumers, but this doesn't leave android in the dark.
Android can tout greater variance/complexity of applications due to more lax
regulation by google. Such as porn, apps that are counter the OS's UX, apps
that reproduce functionality or overtake certain OS features and of course
simple apps.

Millions of increasingly fragmented Android devices out there will not make
the marketplace more attractive to developers. Plus Google is only half
interested, their goal is to get as many Android devices out there, to ensure
Google search and services are the only choice for consumers as this is their
business model. The emergence of a future run by smart phones where search was
commoditised by the phone provider was the motivation for Google into making
Android.

~~~
esmevane
I don't think you really answered anything from his article except the mention
of the ad-supported applications, which you are correct if impolite about.

The rest of your post seems to be filled with content you've prepared ahead of
time?

For example: 'iOS high revenue is not chance', 'iOS is a popular choice',
'android is fragmented'. OK. But, we've all heard those before, and they are
not confronted by the article.

What was confronted by the article was deliberate skewing of charts -
percentage gaming - in order to show unflattering android numbers instead of
actual relevant real-time data.

The author suggests that this is misleading, and it is exactly that. It is the
sort of political tactic which turns this:

"Do you think it's a good idea that children should pass if they have bad test
scores?"

Into this:

"89% of people polled supported No Child Left Behind."

~~~
onemoreact
When the androids authority's best evidence that Android marketplace is not
terrible is to present and tare down a straw man argument that's simply not
convincing. If there was a good news story supported by actual income he could
have said so, but he did not.

There I just refuted his entire argument. Now to support my point of view I
could list all the reasons why Android fails but then you would attack them
and miss the point.

PS: idspispopd was being more polite but he used the same argument.

~~~
esmevane
I really want to see income levels as well. There's no denying that the
article didn't retort with actual data, a huge flaw. I even went to the end of
the article expecting to see a data-driven response, and was disappointed that
there wasn't one.

If you are interested in my honest opinion, I don't feel like you've refuted
anything. May I remind you, the article pointed out the skewed nature of the
charts and claimed that was misleading. I think that in order to refute that,
you would have to supply reasoning as to why it was not misleading or skewed.
Don't you agree?

I will concede that if you feel like this is a faulty stance and you don't
think you need to refute it, that is fine. Why refute something you believe to
be patently false?

It feels like you're attempting to champion something here, and you expect me
to do the same. That seems to be the central theme with a lot of the responses
I'm seeing here.

Why so defensive? What's wrong with someone pointing out bad data? Isn't that
something worth looking into?

~~~
onemoreact
I think he could have pointed out the error in a tweet and I would have been
fine if someone had linked such a tweet.

Having read a little more I was expecting a little more. And sure he presented
a new idea, but it's a well worn argument with plenty of evidence on both
sides of the issue. When you break it down there are two arguments one of
which was well supported and another that was left hanging. And leaving me
hanging makes me feel that the first point was simply a straw man being torn
down which left a bitter taste in my mouth.

PS: I have little skin in this game, Edit: I suspect Android may reach parity
with Apple, but this article did little but annoy me and convince me that we
are far from that parity. aka years vs months.

~~~
esmevane
I don't know if android and iOS will be matched any time soon. One day, cars
could fly (more frequently than they do now).

I'm with you on the essence of the article being worth a blurb or a micropost
of some sort. It was an objection article, without any substantiative data.

I think my root motivation here was the desire to see that substantiative
data, which I think another poster in this comments has provided.

The numbers ARE pretty low in comparison by that data point.

------
ashleyw
He's assuming there aren't ad-supported iOS apps too…

~~~
URSpider94
Exactly. My guess (no data) is that if you lump in ad revenues and in-app
sales, then iOS will maintain its lead.

I would go so far as to speculate that ads sold on iOS might convert better,
since iPhone users are already spending more money on the platform.

------
Jyaif
For what it's worth, for me the Android revenue is 1000% the iOS revenues (for
the exact same game). There's less competition on Android, and I suspect users
are more into hardcore games.

( <http://itunes.apple.com/app/pewpew/id370379981?mt=8> )

------
mcritz
The context of the two platforms is very telling.

You buy an iPhone in a crystal palace.

You buy an Android phone from a "Wireless Store" between a bodega and a
paycheck loan store.

The technology is democratized, but the audience varies.

------
gonzo
Seriously? An article with no stats?

------
albertogh
I'd say it's even lower than 7%, both for paid and ad supported apps, at least
on my experience of having several applications for both iOS and Android.
There is a small percentage of Android users willing to pay for apps,
primarily due to Google not requiring a payment method when setting up your
account and lots of Android users who don't use the smartphone features. This,
in turn, makes the CPM lower in ad supported apps, since the ads have smaller
returns and thus the advertisers pay less for them (compared to iOS).

Just to prove my point, here are yesterday's profits for a couple of apps:

\- Paid app:

    
    
        - iOS: $128
        - Android: $6
    

\- Ad supported app:

    
    
        - iOS: $1285
        - Android: $21
    

And that's without taking into account that Apple does most of the tax
collection/invoicing for me while Google does not, despite taking the same
sales percentage.

~~~
bookwormAT
which apps are that? Thanks for sharing.

~~~
friendy123
Gasofa, buzzie, iRae

