Google is destroying Apple in the app game — except where it counts
Android is dominating app stores but Apple is still beating Google in one extremely important metric: revenue.
Cupertino made nearly twice as much money from its App Store in 2017 as Google did from Google Play, despite seeing only a fraction of the downloads, according to a new report out today from App Annie.
Just how big is the difference? Apple made $34 billion on 29 billion app downloads in 2016, according to the company's data. Google, by comparison, made $10 billion on 63 billion downloads in 2016.
Put another way, Apple made more than three times as much money as Google with less than half as many downloads.
While data has long shown that iOS users are more likely to pay for apps than their Android-using counterparts, there's a China-sized reason for the disparity. Because Google Play doesn't have a presence in China, third-party app stores -- like those from Baidu and Xiaomi -- dominate the market, even though Apple's China business is growing.
The result is that Google, whose users were already somewhat notorious for not spending money on apps, is losing out on huge amounts of revenue by not having its Play Store in China.
Apple made more than three times as much money as Google with less than half as many downloads
This becomes even more apparent looking at App Annie's forecast for next year. Apple is projected to make $40 billion off 30 billion downloads while Google is expected to make $21 billion off 114 billion downloads. Meanwhile, alternative Android app stores are projected to make $20 billion on 51 billion downloads in 2017.
But it's not all bad news for Google. Google's revenue is growing at faster rate than that of other Android app stores and downloads have already far outpaced Apple's. Google's mobile app revenue is expected to double to $42 billion by 2021, according to App Annie, while downloads will balloon to nearly 200 billion. Apple is forecasted to make $60 billion on 42 billion downloads and alternative stores will rake in $36 billion on 112 billion downloads.
Karissa was Mashable's Senior Tech Reporter, and is based in San Francisco. She covers social media platforms, Silicon Valley, and the many ways technology is changing our lives. Her work has also appeared in Wired, Macworld, Popular Mechanics, and The Wirecutter. In her free time, she enjoys snowboarding and watching too many cat videos on Instagram. Follow her on Twitter @karissabe.
