Interesting App Store Statistics

Posted: January 3rd, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Apps, Development, Mobile | Tags: , , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

Here are some interesting and quite surprising statistics for the US Census Browser HTML/PhoneGap showcase application that I released in December, which I wanted to share. The app is a browser for US Census data, full detail available here: http://www.tricedesigns.com/2010-census/. The Census Browser application was intended as a showcase app for enterprise-class data visualization in HTML-based applications, and all source code is freely available to the public.

What is really surprising is the “health” of my app within the given ecosystems. I offered the app as a free download in each market. The app is focused on Census data, so there is obviously not a ton of consumer demand, however the data is still interesting to play around with. I would not expect the same results for all types of apps in all markets.

Here are a few observations from the data:

  • Barnes & Noble Nook downloads far exceeded all other markets combined (69% of all downloads)
  • BlackBerry Playbook downloads were in 3rd, just behind iOS (BB is 11% of all downloads)
  • Android traffic was minimal (2% of all downloads)

The general public perception/assumption that I encounter is that the iOS market is strongest, followed by Android, and that BB is dead. These numbers show a conflicting reality. Barnes & Noble was the strongest, with iOS in second place, and BlackBerry just behind iOS.

Here is the full data for downloads in December:

Market Release Date # Downloads Link Notes
iOS 12/4/11 1151 link (iPad only)
Android (Google) 12/6/11 58 link (large-xlarge screens only)
Android (Amazon) 12/6/11 63 link (includes Kindle Fire)
BlackBerry 12/14/11 752 link (PlayBook only)
Barnes & Noble 12/20/11 4508 link (Nook)

Other Observations

Here are a few other observations from analyzing the download statistics for the various app markets…

Lots of people got Nook devices for Christmas this year:

BlackBerry Playbook downloads spiked from the BerryReview.com app review:

iOS traffic peaked just after the inital release with an increase after the winter holidays, but has been more-or-less consistent with no “spike”:

Amazon Market only had 8 downloads on Christmas day – this is likely the result of the fact that the Kindle Fire is branded as a consumer media device, not an analytics/computing device:

Know what else is interesting?   The charting/analytics for Amazon, Google, and Nook markets are all built with Adobe Flash, with both Amazon and Nook built using Adobe Flex.

4 Comments on “Interesting App Store Statistics”

  1. 1 JCLang said at 5:17 AM on January 4th, 2012:

    Thanks for these interesting info.

    One question though, I don’t understand your statement “BB is dead”.
    According to these numbers, I’d say BB PlayBook is in very good shape!

    (is it a typo. between BB and Android ?)

  2. 2 Andrew said at 9:23 AM on January 4th, 2012:

    JCLang, I didn’t say that “BB is dead”. I said “The general public perception/assumption that I encounter is that the iOS market is strongest, followed by Android, and that BB is dead. These numbers show a conflicting reality.” When I speak with developers (which I do often), most consider that Android and iOS are their primary targets b/c they are the largest. Generally these developers do not give much additional thought to BlackBerry b/c they perceive that a market does not exist for the BlackBerry device. My statement “These numbers show a conflicting reality” implies that the numbers that I published show real-world statistics which contradict with the assumption that BB is not a healthy market. In fact, it *could* have strong sales. I have heard of other developers whose application sales are higher in BB than in other markets (Android, Amazon, etc…), however I have also heard of developers who have almost no sales in BB… it really depends on the application.

  3. 3 JCLang said at 1:54 PM on January 4th, 2012:

    Ah ok, I’ve misunderstood. Thx for the clarification.

    I’m quite impressed by the Nook numbers btw! May be time to make some dev. for this tablet too.

  4. 4 alfonso said at 6:58 PM on January 21st, 2012:

    should be more careful with the wording brother. is more clear for the next

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