The market for mobile apps for Android and iOS devices has been exhibiting strong growth over the past several years, and it seems like the trend will continue into the next decade.
According to a recently published report from App Annie, Apple’s iOS App Store will maintain its lead for at least the next five years, but when you combine Google’s Play Store and third-party Android app stores, App Annie says that overall revenues will beat those of Apple’s App Store in 2017.
As you can see from the chart above, we’ll see healthy, double-digit growth for the next several years, until total app store revenues hit a whopping $139.1 billion in 2021. Nearly half of that, or $60 billion is expected to come through the iOS App Store, says App Annie.
Apple still has the advantage over Google because of its premium positioning. The average iPhone user has more spending power than the average Android user, and that’s understandable because Android smartphones come in a wide range of prices covering multiple socio-economic market segments.
But Google’s Android user base has the power of sheer numbers. In terms of mobile operating system market share, Android boasts 66.71 percent against Apple’s 29.55 percent for iOS, according to February numbers published by NetMarketShare.
Double the user base is huge, but the gap between Android and iOS becomes even wider when you narrow in on the smartphone segment. According to IDC, “Android dominated the market with 86.8% share in 2016Q3.”
Either way you look at it, Google’s mobile OS has strength in numbers, while Apple’s strength is its average spend per user. And those numbers look like they’re going to yield handsome dividends for app developers.
You can download App Annie’s full report here.
Thanks for reading our work! Please bookmark 1redDrop.com to keep tabs on the hottest, most happening tech and business news from around the world. On Apple News, please favorite the 1redDrop channel to get us in your news feed.
