According to a new report from app intelligence firm Sensor Tower, global app revenue climbed 35 percent in 2017 to reach nearly $60 billion.
The report also found that Apple’s App Store is pulling nearly double the revenue of the Google Play Store. Last year, App Store revenue reached $38.5 billion, while the Play Store reached $20.1 billion.
The App Store grew a total of 34.7 percent year-over-year, while the Google Play Store grew 34.2 percent. Combined the two app marketplaces created a total of $58.7 billion in revenue, up approximately 35 percent from 2016.
The report from Sensor Tower align with Apple’s own figures that they released yesterday. On Thursday, Apple said it had a record-breaking holiday season with over a billion dollars in revenue.
A cause for the increase in revenue is likely due to mobile growth in emerging markets, as well as Apple’s new support for in-app subscriptions. First-time app installs across both marketplaces were also up, which is most likely also being driven by the growth of mobile in emerging markets.
Interestingly, the growth rate of app downloads on the Google Play Store are much larger than Apple’s App Store, at 16.7 percent versus 6.7 percent. This is most likely due to the amount of lower-cost Android devices available in emerging markets.
[via TechCrunch]
