Apple says its global developer community has earned over $70 billion since the Apple App Store launched in 2008. In the past 12 months alone, downloads have grown over 70%, says Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.
He adds that since the release of iOS 10 last fall, iPhone and iPad users have also experienced “new engaging and creative ways to connect,” such as giving a friend a Starbucks gift card using Apple Pay and collaborating on a fashion design sketch using Prêt à Template. With the subscription business model now available to developers across all 25 app categories, the App Store’s active paid subscriptions are up 58% year-over-year.
Schiller says that App Store developers from around the world create apps for customers in 155 countries. Gaming and Entertainment are top-grossing categories, and Lifestyle apps, as well as Health and Fitness, have experienced over 70% growth in the past year. The Photo and Video category is also among the fastest-growing at nearly 90% growth.
