Android developers update apps about twice as often as their iOS counterparts, but it’s iPhone users who may be more receptive, according to a report the University di Udine (Italy), as noted by FierceWireless. “Updates Management in Mobile Applications. iTunes vs Google Play” based on research looking across the top 1,000 apps across both app stores.
According to the report:
- Apps on Google Play are being updated on average every 28 days, while apps on iTunes are being updated every 59 days.
- There’s a significant difference between the two stores in terms of the number of apps with in-app purchases: 29.7% of the Google Play sample has in-app purchases, while in iTunes the same occurs in 56.2% of apps.Download figures are around five times higher on Google Play than the App Store.
- User ratings across the top 1,000 apps on both stores were more than 4 stars but the number of users providing a rating was double on Google Play.
- iOS apps in the top 1,000 were older on average than Google Play top 1,000 apps, suggesting a higher turnover rate for the most popular Android apps.
- In both stores around a third (35%) of apps are local (defined as at least 40% of its downloads coming from its country of origin).
- On average, in Google Play, a developer distributes 7.182 top-ranked apps. The figure for iTunes is 8.925.
- On average an app enters the top-1,000 ranking in about 2 out of 5 countries in both stores (1.877 in Google Play and 2.027 in iTunes).
- The iTunes “App store review guidelines” explicitly sets a strict screening of apps quality. For example, apps that exhibit bugs or that are in a beta/trial version are going to be rejected by the store. By contrast, publication on Google Play doesn’t go through a similar quality check; updates can be published instantaneously by developers with a “simple click of the mouse.”
