Filed under: WWDC, Developer, iPhone
Survey: 70% of all iPhone Apps May be Free
Yes, you read that headline right. According to a survey of developers conducted this week at Apple's World Wide Developer Conference, and highlighted over at Apple Insider, many of the potential applications being developed for the iPhone will have an average cost of $3.00 or under -- and many others may be completely free. The survey, conducted by Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster right after the Steve Jobs Keynote on Monday, revealed some other interesting information besides potential application pricing.The survey also found that 50% of the developers plan on building applications only for the iPhone while the other 50% were going to make application for the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and for Macs as well. In addition, Munster found that many developers were also authoring what he called "Enterprise apps" as well as entertainment apps, location-based apps which take advantage of the iPhone's GPS capabilities and video games.
According to Munster: "We see this as a positive indicator of the potential for Enterprise adoption of the iPhone. We found the average cost of iPhone apps on the App Store to be $2.29, with 71% being free." So, if you love the iPhone or iPod Touch and plan on putting lots of applications on them, if the survey proves correct, this is good news for you.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Andrew Rush said 1:33PM on 6-11-2008
Well, when you look at how many free apps are on Installer for unlocked iPhones it's no surprise. My guess is developers will release free versions of their app for the iPhone and then have a more powerful desktop version. The AppStore could be like free advertising!
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Andrew Rush said 1:34PM on 6-11-2008
that post should read "...and then have a more powerful desktop version that they could charge money for."
Sorry for the lack of proof reading haha.
Chris said 1:42PM on 6-11-2008
Actually, 100% of the apps *may* be free, but only 70% of them are estimated to be free.
:)
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puffin said 1:43PM on 6-11-2008
Since Apple probably won't allow their App store to become the Wild West of iPhone development, I'm pretty sure we are going to see only hand chosen / tested products available on it. So free or not, third party app injection will be viable and needed source from the get go of the 2.0 firmware era.
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Brooks said 1:44PM on 6-11-2008
There's a math question here: are the 71% of apps that are free factored into that $2.29 average price, or is the $2.29 the average price *for apps that are not free*.
If the latter, great. If the former, then the average price for non-free apps is $7.90, which is a different story.
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apollo2011 said 3:43PM on 6-11-2008
My thoughts exactly when I was reading the post. We will need some clarification on this.
I almost think the numbers in the article must include the 70% of free apps, because it seems like a lot of applications, like games, are going to be at a $9.99 price point, which is closer to the $7.90 you calculated.
YodaMac said 1:45PM on 6-11-2008
And so what will happen to Web Apps?
Can I really fit App Store versions of all my Web Apps on an 8 or 16 GB iPhone (alongside my music, et al.)??
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Rich UK said 1:58PM on 6-11-2008
Aren't these apps going to be in the
Rich UK said 2:00PM on 6-11-2008
What the hell happened to my comment?
Aren't these apps going to be
Splunkster said 2:14PM on 6-11-2008
Going to be what? lol
Rich UK said 2:16PM on 6-11-2008
in the MB range and won't take up much space. What gives TUAW?
James Donevan said 1:46PM on 6-11-2008
Your line: "The survey also found that 50% of the developers plan on building applications only for the iPhone while the other 50% were going to make application for the iPhone, the iPod Touch, and for Macs as well" is an incorrect paraphrasing of the report.
In fact the survey notes "50% of the developers were in attendance because they plan to focus solely on developing applications for iPhone and iPod touch, while the remaining 50% are doing the same in addition to writing software for Macs."
Significant difference.
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Chris Ullrich said 2:48PM on 6-11-2008
Yes, that should have read slightly differently. Thanks for pointing it out.
Rich UK said 1:55PM on 6-11-2008
This is absolute rubbish... a survey of 10 iphone/ipod touch developers.. you can't estimate anything from that.
Aren't there something like 2,500 developers in the programme? These results just aren't scalable.
Terrible piece of journalism.
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MoonMan said 2:38PM on 6-11-2008
(psst - they're not journalists... just a bunch of kids that steal news from other sources, then f*ck it up)
Chris Ullrich said 2:51PM on 6-11-2008
Actually, it was 20 developers and I'm just reporting what the survey said, not judging the veracity of the results.
MoonMan said 3:49PM on 6-11-2008
@ Chris Ullrich:
No, stop using the word "reporting". You are not reporting, you are just regurgitating info gleaned from someone else's article, and doing a bad job of it.
Rich UK said 6:27PM on 6-11-2008
Also from what I gather 50% (10 of the 20 respondents) were developing for only the mac and 50% for the iphone. Surely then, only 70% of the 50% (10 people) were saying they would release free apps for the iphone. So all in all this article states, that at WWDC, 7 developers said they'd release free apps for the iphone.
How does this possible equate to anything!
John Kirk said 2:02AM on 6-12-2008
Everyone is way over reacting to this story. If I read it right he casually interview 20 developers. That means 14 said their apps would be free. If one more had said yes to free apps we'd be talking about 75% instead of 70%. Similarly, if one less had said his Apps would be free, then we'd be using 65% as the basis for our conversation.
20 developers. Picked at random. In a casual unscientific survey. For all we know, 70% of the upcoming applications could have a fee associated with them. This straw poll is being taken way, way too seriously.
Justin Seeley said 3:01PM on 6-11-2008
Although I hope this is going to be true... I seriously doubt it. Wasn't there a piece of news recently that said Apple was encouraging devs to charge?
NOTE: TUAW seems to be having a problem loading... The front page is especially slow.
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