Are they worth it?
App store market researcher Distimo has released its October report and it reveals some interesting trends.
The first thing to jump out at us is how much more expensive iPad apps are, on average, than iPhone ones. The report revealed that the average price of the top 100 paid-for apps in the US iPad app store was $5.80, while the equivalent figure for the iPhone app store was $2.14. So iPad apps are, on average, 171 percent more expensive than iPhone ones.
It must be stressed, however, that the iPad app store is still in its infancy. The Apple app store now has over 300,000 apps, but only 37,887 of these are specifically for the iPad. There seems to be a sweet-spot for iPhone apps as $0.99, we assume the iPad app market has yet to find its sweet spot.
It's also worth noting that, while the proportion is growing, currently only seven percent of apps work on both devices.
Apple itself is a major player in the iPad app market, but less so with the iPhone. Three of the top ten paid iPad apps in September were $9.99 Apple productivity apps: Pages (2), Keynote (6) and Numbers (7). No Apple apps featured among either the top 10 free, or paid iPhone apps.
On the Android market Google, which makes noise about its own products, has a couple in the free top ten - Maps (2) and Sky Map (7) - but no paid ones. RIM has five of the top ten free apps in the BlackBerry store, including the top two (app world and BBM), but none of the paid ones.
Microsoft has three of the top six free apps on its store, including the number one (My Phone), but none in the paid top ten. Nokia is directly responsible for none of their the free or paid top ten in the Ovi store. The same is pretty much true of Palm, although it's the listed publisher of the Facebook app, which is the most popular free one.
