

Google Android and iPhone Apps downloads are similar (Image) - stejules
http://androgeek.com/android-and-iphone-apps-downloads-are-similar-image.html
The adMob report “January 2010 Mobile Metrics Report” shows  that Google Android Apps downloads are approaching the iPhone app downloads
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jwr
Careful with conclusions. These graphs have been carefully prepared.

Notice how:

1\. Paid apps and free apps are lumped together, you can't really see the
difference in paid apps clearly. This is important from a developer standpoint
— only paid apps will pay your salary.

2\. iPhone OS is split into two platforms, while all Android devices are
lumped together. Huh?

3\. Everything is on a per-user basis. This is fine, but those are not the
numbers you should be looking at if you are a developer (as most of us on
Hacker News are). You want the aggregate market size. You want to plan your
revenues. You don't want per-user statistics.

~~~
voidpointer
Yep. I'd go as far as saying that the fact that Android users, on average, are
downloading a similar number of apps as iphone users is hardly interesting at
all. The average smartphone user just seems to get around 9 free and one or
two paid apps per month. What is important is the number of users that are
doing this on a particular platform and maybe any associated trends, if they
exist.

The correct headline for this information is "iphone and android users have
similar app download behavior". The actual headline implies that Android app
download volume would be similar to iphone volume. That would have been a bit
of a sensation (to me)... But that's just not what happened.

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glhaynes
Honestly I'm kind of surprised the Android numbers aren't higher, since
Android device sales so far have presumably skewed heavily toward "geeks" who
seem more likely to download stuff just to try it out.

Perhaps it's a function of there just being fewer apps available and, of those
apps that are available, many may be coming from non-Android Market suppliers?

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tvon
The PDF of the full report (much more interesting) is here:

[http://metrics.admob.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/AdMob-
Mo...](http://metrics.admob.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/AdMob-Mobile-
Metrics-Jan-10.pdf)

I'm not sure if it's worth re-submitting the AdMob post, but I did so here:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1158960>

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bartgatsby1
Thats no surprise the only difference is with android you can get apps that
get rejected from apple and more good free apps.

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tvon
That's silly, it's not as if rejected App Store apps magically get rewritten
and submitted to the Android Market, and the "more good free apps" comment is,
so far as I can tell, pulled from thin air.

Besides, if it was that simple the Android numbers would beat the iPhone, and
if you actually treat this as "App Store" vs "Android Market" it's more like
10.5 to 8.1 (respectively).

