Although the Windows Phone 7 operating system isn’t the most popular, the marketplace for downloadable apps just hit the 25,000 mark. Over 2,000 of those apps were actually added over the past two weeks. Maybe this is a sign that users are getting ready to enjoy the Windows Phone 7 OS on smartphones. Of the 25,000+ apps, 51 percent of them are free, 30 percent are paid apps and 10 percent are apps that are paid, but come with a free trial period. These apps are coming from some of the over 7,000 approved WP7 developers.
Game apps will always be the most popular and for WP7, games are marked at 17 percent of all apps with books at 13 percent and other entertainment apps at 11 percent. The top 5 paid apps in the marketplace are games, which may come as no surprise as the Xbox Live gamers transition to Windows Phone 7. When the total WP7 apps hit 18,000 in May of this year the growth was about 150 apps per day or 7,000 apps added per month. The WP7 app marketplace is quite small when compared to the Android Market (300,000 apps) or the iTunes App Store (500,000 apps), but the WP7 devices haven’t really been popping up just yet. One of the most popular apps of all time, Angry Birds, was finally released for WP7.
The International Data Corporation is predicting that the Windows Phone 7 will outgrow Android and iOS over the next few years. Since Nokia and Microsoft have formed a partnership, WP7 sure has as good a chance as anyone to move into the number one spot. Nokia is the largest phone manufacturer in the world and if they are making phones that run on the WP7 OS, by sheer volume alone, the popularity will grow with each new phone launch.
The size of your app store doesn’t have much impact on how popular your OS is, however, the more apps you have the more likely you are to attract new users or customers that want to switch phones. Each year, more people are looking to update their contract and they will always go with the more attractive bundle of apps, pricing and phone features. With the Mango update coming for Windows Phone 7, I think they over 500 updates will attract enough new users to give Microsoft an edge in the very tough mobile market.
