14 DAY TRIAL // One of the stars at CES 2011, Google's Android operating system is one of the most popular mobile platforms these days. Previously reported by AndroLib as having around 200,000 apps, the Android Market is one of the largest apps stores.
However, it seems that AndroidLib's number is far from accurate, as app store analytics company Distimo, a more trustworthy source, has just reported that the Android Market is the second largest apps store with roughly 130,000 apps.
Distimo's report covers the Apple App Store, Google Android Market, Blackberry App World, Nokia Ovi Store, Palm App Catalog, Windows Marketplace for Mobile (6.x) and Windows Phone 7 Marketplace. Data recorded in 2010 has been taken into consideration for the paper.
According to the published report, Apple's App Store has seen the highest growth doubling its total number of application since last year to 300,000.
As expected, Google's Android Market came in second with 130,000 apps, which is 6 times the number of apps available one year ago.
Nokia Ovi Store seems to be gaining some momentum, with 25,000 apps, while Blackberry's App World has nearly reached 18,000 apps.
Furthermore, it seems that the high number of downloads for free apps has prompted developers to switch to monetization methods other than asking a price for the apps themselves.
The top 300 free apps in the United States generated around 3 million downloads each day during December 2010, but only 350,000 paid apps are downloaded daily.
Still, according to the report, paid downloads increased almost 30% more than free downloads in the top 300 when comparing December 2010 with June 2010.
The average price of the apps also declined, while the proportion of free apps grew.
To no surprise, the Angry Birds series is the most popular game with six appearances in the top lists of all application stores.
The most popular non-game application is Facebook , with the same number of appearances in the top lists.
