Android developers may be starting to catch up with their iOS counterparts in winning over customers, based on a global survey of app store activity over the last four months of 2012.
In Distimo's year-in-review report, the app analytics and conversion tracking firm looked at downloads across more than 20 countries to gauge the growth and effectiveness of the major app distribution sources. Daily revenue for Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) App Store, for instance, saw an aggregated increase in daily revenue of 21 percent. For Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) Play, however, the news was even better. Distimo said aggregated daily revenues for the Android app store surged 43 percent. That being said, Distimo was careful to point out that Apple App Store revenues were already much higher in absolute daily values.
"Looking at the worldwide daily download and revenue volumes, the opportunity is really huge," the report says. "The revenues in the Apple App Store are $15 million on a typical day in November 2012, while in Google Play the daily revenues were just below $3.5 million."
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Google Play had an aggregated growth of 43% in daily revenues, while Apple App Store growth was 21%. App Store revenue growth since January 2012 was 51%. |
The Distimo report highlights the extremely rapid uptake of some of the world's most successful apps. This includes Line Pop, a game from Asian publisher Naver, which Distimo estimated was downloaded more than 1.75 million times within its first three days. "This is remarkable when you stop to consider that it took AOL nine years, Facebook nine months and Draw Something nine days to reach the one million users milestone," the report noted.
As developers continue to explore their options around monetization, the Distimo research dove a bit deeper into in-app purchasing as a way of getting consumers to open their wallets. In 2012, in-app purchasing represented 69 percent of revenues, increasing from 53 percent last year, according to Distimo. One-off fees (such as paid apps) made up 35 percent of app revenue among the top 10 publishers--including Electronic Arts and Gameloft--last year.
Make no mistake, however; much of the money goes to a small handful of publishers. The Distimo report said only four applications accounted for 10 percent of all revenue in Google Play, while in the Apple App Store for iPad six apps made up the same percentage.
For more:
- read the full Distimo report
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