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Let's all play "The Game Of Phones"

Posted: , by Alan F.

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Let's all play
The Game Of Phones

The Game Of Phones

App Annie has an infographic to stare at called "The Game Of Phones" and it is basically looking at the competition between the App Store and the Google Play Store as though it were a child's game. Among the stats on the graph, the one showing global market share is the most telling as iOS is the top platform, garnering a commanding 71% of revenues in the Global Market. That compares with the 29% of the worldwide market owned by Android and makes you wonder why Google hasn't been able to use its lead in worldwide smartphone sales to its advantage here. This year, both iOS and Android have had a 14% growth rate year-to-date which shows that Google still is not closing the gap with Apple. With 88% growth this year in the Google Play Store, Brazil leads the way for Android growth, followed by 23% growth this year in Japan, 20% in Russia and 19% in the States. iOS has been led this year by Japan's 22% growth followed by 17% in Russia, 13% in the U.S. and 12% in France.

Whether you count by revenue or downloads, the U.S. tops the list for both platforms. The Google Play Store gets 45% of its revenues and 35% of its downloads from the States while for iOS the figures are 42% and 28% respectively. In Asia, iOS has been able to hold its lead with a quarter of App Store downloads coming from that region. According to App Annie, China and Korea have plenty of third party app stores for Android that are preventing the Google Play Store from gaining traction.

With Google I/O opening next week, these numbers might be fodder for those developers who believe that some big changes are needed for the Google Play Store to catch up with the App Store.

source: AppAnnie via IntoMobile

7 Comments
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posted on 22 Jun 2012, 06:31 1
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1. Non_Sequitur (Posts: 1111; Member since: 16 Mar 2012)


Hm... Google needs to ramp up the Play Store a little bit. Get some good devs in there.

posted on 22 Jun 2012, 16:20
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4. downphoenix (Posts: 3165; Member since: 19 Jun 2010)


Its a hard and arduous process. Many software developers are still insisting on sticking solely with iOS due to the ease of publishing, not having to develop for dozens of skus, only a handful, and the supposed "fact" that iphone owners are richer than Android. Could be some truth to that though, Blackberry app developers seem to do pretty well for themselves despite the small market, and I remember phone arena did osme article that showed that the highest income levels seemed to prefer blackberry most.

posted on 22 Jun 2012, 08:19 2
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2. -box- (Posts: 3991; Member since: 04 Jan 2012)


Free apps on Android are apparently more available and preferable to paid ones, AND Android has more capabilities out of the box so it's less reliant on apps to do ANYTHING. Remember, iDevices are just app launchers. IDevice users are limited (for non-jailbroken models) to the factory app store, and in order to get full functionality and no ads, they have to pony up cash for them. Sure most may be only a dollar, but that is a dollar immediately gained by the maker instead if a dollar attempted to be gained by in-app purchases or ads for free apps.

If ios had more freedom and native capabilities, I'd see this statistic changing. But since apple loves its revenues (and since they love that the iPhone is the most expensive carrier-subsidized smartphone to own, operate, and insure in North America, mostly due to apps) that that is highly unlikely, until Android and Windows Phone make more strides in the app markets

posted on 22 Jun 2012, 16:35
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6. E.N. (Posts: 2610; Member since: 25 Jan 2009)


for the most part, android is an "app-launcher" as well. What are you doing with your phone if you're not launching applications to make phone calls, send messages, watch videos, play games, etc.? Staring at your wallpaper?

posted on 22 Jun 2012, 16:41
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7. downphoenix (Posts: 3165; Member since: 19 Jun 2010)


Well there's widgets. But I guess those are just apps that auto run and are on the desktop. I guess people just bash Iphone as app launcher because it doesnt have a real desktop, when Android's desktop is just there, and doesnt really serve any functionality other than widgets.

posted on 22 Jun 2012, 10:40 1
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3. seanjohnusa91 (Posts: 31; Member since: 01 Nov 2011)


I thought this was a legit game for download when I first saw the title

posted on 22 Jun 2012, 16:31
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5. downphoenix (Posts: 3165; Member since: 19 Jun 2010)


I think there are 2 main reasons:

1) Low end skus on android need to be compared with higher end skus. I have a gut feeling low end phones purchase a lot less apps, since they seem to be preferred by those that are just upgrading from feature phones, used to payng $5 for a crappy game, when they can get same game for free.

2) App developers in question are limited. Not many major software and game companies make android apps, their support in anemic, some even develop with WP and Blackberry over Android, despite the huge, huge difference in marketshare. As for why App developers wont go to Android, the only legitimate reason I can think of is Piracy. However, I really doubt Piracy is nearly as rampant on Android as it is with PC or even consoles. After all, the apps and games are ridiculously cheap compared to those. Seriously, just look at the list of game developers traditionally PC or console that are on Android vs iOS. Outside of Nintendo and Sony, EVERYONE is on iOS. Android... well, a number of them are there, but often has only a few games. Its very telling when Square Enix supports Windows Phone 7 with Final Fantasy and Blackberry Playbook with Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, and we cant get EITHER of these games on Android, WTH?

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