The sooner every party breaks up the better - Jane Austen's Emma
|
|
|
Analysts claim Android apps are too expensive
SOFTWARE APPLICATIONS that are available through Google's Android Market app store are overpriced and are upsetting the balance of the industry, according to analysts.
Over at Canalys the bean counters are concerned that the top paid-for apps from the Android Market cost more than their equivalents on the Apple store. They warn that this means that Android users are paying two and a half times more for software toys than their Apple using peers.
This is not just bad news for users, as the outfit said that developers might also suffer as Android smartphone owners could be less likely to buy apps.
"That developers can apparently charge more for their apps on Android and make it into the top paid list is clearly a positive. But the reality is that with fewer people willing to purchase apps on Android than on iOS today, there is more of a necessity to do so," said Canalys managing director for Mobile, Rachel Lashford.
"Developers and publishers need to balance the IOS volume opportunity with a potentially greater value per download opportunity on Android, where more apps command higher price points. Selling more apps at higher prices is the Holy Grail for developers, but achieving big volumes of paid apps on Android is no small challenge."
Lashford said that developers should pursue "more aggressive price competition" and try to tempt those users that so far have resisted paid-for apps in favour of free alternatives.
Canalys conducted its study in the United States and found that buying the top 100 paid-for apps in the Android store would cost $374.37, but by comparison, doing the same on the Apple App Store would cost only $147.00.
It said 82 of the top 100 paid apps in the Apple App Store costs $0.99, compared to just 22 in the Android Market. µ
Share this:
Share
The logic behind the conclusion is inverted. If developers can charge more with Android, why would they be less inclined to develop more Android apps?
IF YOU CANT AFFORD IT YOU CAN JUST STEAL THEM. I SAW A TORRENT WITH LIKE 1700 ANDROID APPS FREE TO DOWNLOAD. NO KIDDING!
SADLY, I DONT THINK YOU CAN DO THAT WITH IOS.
i could not predict. Unless this was just a smaller data set's monstrous statistic fluctuation. Apple was always meaning higher prices for everything. And approximately the same factor two or three. Wow! Can anyone investigate this further?
Funny how that's changed since everyone has discovered in-app purchases in iOS land :-)
The other issue as mentioned is Android apps are lower volume. Fixed development costs + lower volume = higher prices...unless you want the developers to stop developing for the platform...
Blackberry apps are the highest priced...they have low volume as well...
What a sad attempt for true journalism. More like an election year campaign smear ad. Time and time again the biggest complaint I get from my ios counterparts is app cost. The open development architecture of Google's OS has allowed for more competitive app building and therefore pricing. Also, as a personal experience, I have from when experiencing issues with apps I can contact the developer and get better support than my iPhone friends can. Sorry, you are not getting me to surrender and move to big brother controlled empire.
Apple is nothing more than AT&T in drag.
Seriously, some people get paid to produce such crappy stuff?
Comparing the Top 100 most downloaded paid apps from both sets only allows for comparison on price if they are the same apps, any other comparisons drawn are purely speculative. The findings shown here could be used to argue that it means Android users are willing to pay for a quality app instead of a cheap time killer just as much as it means that Android users are stuck paying more for apps.
People don't need to buy as many apps for Android as do users of iOS. An iPhone or iPad is practically worthless without paid for apps.
Since when did not needing to buy apps become a problem? Apple created a dependency on apps to make its products work. Too bad.
This is true. I would buy more apps for my Android phone if they were not so expensive. Itunes is way cheaper and has way more selections. I'm considering the switch to Iphone.
Apple FanBoys.
Though I wouldn't dispute the facts about the number of top 0.99 cent apps on the ios vs android, there is one important point not considered: market size.
Although the android market size is exploding, apple has simply been around for much longer. The number of paying customers is simply much bigger, for now.
So when a business takes that into consideration, it only makes sense to price android apps higher, simply because there will be fewer sales. On top of that, switching from one os to the other will probably not happen on the basis of an app's price alone.
In the end, judging the two platforms solely on app prices is over-simplifying them.
They claim the business models are different. They claim in-app purchases are more the norm in iOS while in android apps usually sell for a fixed price. They also say that there are more free apps ranking up the prices of the payed ones.
So, if you only count market price of Android apps and ignore the free ones, then yes, they are more expensive. But that's a lot of "ifs"