Over the past year or so, the Google Play Store has caught up to Apple’s App Store in almost every way possible. A while back, the App Store was considered the biggest reason to use iOS over Android, but recently, that has almost reversed. Some people say that because Google Play is almost entirely open and now offers almost all the same apps as iOS, it is now superior to Apple’s offering. There’s always been one thing plaguing the Play Store’s numbers, though, and that is app revenue. Developers notoriously do not make as much money with their Android apps as with their iOS apps. According to a new report from App Annie, however, that is starting to change.
According to the report, in Q4 2012, the App Store saw four times as many sales as the Play Store, but in Q1 2013, that number fell to 2.6 times. That’s a good sign for developers, as it means that the quality of Android apps are increasing, and people’s trust in Google and the Play Store is improving. In terms of pure downloads, Apple still lead slightly, but Google Play reached close to 90 percent of App Store downloads.
As far as countries of use go, the top five countries downloading Android apps were the U.S., South Korea, India, Russia, and Japan. Russia was the country that saw the biggest lead, while South Korea and India stayed steady. In terms of revenue, Japan was first, followed by South Korea, the US, the UK, and Germany.
Games were the most popular and largest growing apps in Q1 2013, especially in terms of revenue. The category accounted for 80 percent of Google Play revenue and 70 percent of iOS revenue. Social networking apps grew to become one of the top five app categories in Google Play.
You have to give Google credit for the work it has put into making the Play Store the central hub for everything Android users need, recently adding music, TV shows, books, and music. This has undoubtedly helped the ecosystem’s growth, and has we head further into 2013, we can only expect the Play Store to continue growing.