Android Market sees rapid growth
The Google Android Market has reached the 400,000 active applications mark, according to Distimo, putting Android closer to the half million app mark. In April 2011, the Android market surpassed the 200,000 mark and quickly reached 300,000 in August of 2011.
Distimo says the high volume of free applications has pushed this growth, as two in three apps in the Market are free. Interestingly, the percentage of free applications has grown from 60 percent in April 2011 to 68 percent at the end of 2011 which Distimo says is due in part to the freemium business model wherein apps are free for a certain period of time or free until a user wants more advanced “pro” features.
The company points out that the pace of growth of apps to hit 400,000 apps for the iPhone was two months faster than the Google Android Market, and they say it is interesting “that Android Market has taken 31 months to reach the 200,000 milestone, while Apple only needed 22 months to do this for iPhone apps. However, Android Market needed only four more months to pass the 300,000 milestone, while the App Store for iPhone needed eight more months after Apple hits the 200,000 milestone. Moreover, the gap between the 300K and 400K milestone is also smaller for the Android Market than for the Apple App Store for iPhone, 4 and 7 months respectively.”
With an average of 4.1 applications per developer, the Android Market now has over 100,000 publishers active in their application store. A year ago, the average was 5 apps per developers, but Distimo notes that Google and developers have removed apps for various reasons including copyright infringement, however, they remain much more relaxed than the approval process for iTunes which could contribute to is rapidly accelerating growth of app options.
