Games are still the dominant apps category

The latest Distimo report is out for Q3 2010 and it’s got lots of good information on how the app world is doing in the US. Especially the continued dominance of games as the top apps in nearly all app stores.

The report covers the most popular applications in the Apple App Store for iPad, Apple App Store for iPhone, BlackBerry App World (worldwide), Google Android Market, Nokia Ovi Store, Palm App Catalog and Windows Marketplace for Mobile for Q3 2010.

The most popular free applications by platform are the homegrown apps in four out of the seven app stores, it seems that the more mature the app store, the less likely it is that the top app is a proprietary app. So iPhone, Android and Ovi all have apps from third parties where as the smaller app stores lead users to go for the safe option.

iPad – iBooks (Apple)
iPhone – Type n Talk (Jirbo)
BlackBerry App World – BlackBerry Messenger (RIM)
Google Android Market – Pandora Radio (Pandora)
Nokia Ovi Store – ZumZum (innerActive)
Palm App Catalog – Facebook (Palm)
Windows Marketplace for Mobile – Microsoft My Phone – (Microsoft)

Interestingly it’s still games that lead the top apps – even with a market as mature as the Apple App Store for iPhone where you would expect other categories to dominate – games are still the most dominant, which has the most Games (55% free, 55% paid) among the 100 most popular applications, followed by Windows Marketplace for Mobile (23% free, 45% paid), and the Apple App Store for iPad (25% free, 40% paid). Games are least popular in BlackBerry App World (12.5% free, 28% paid) and Palm App Catalog (33% free, 16% paid).

The most popular paid applications by platform are;

Apple App Store for iPad – Pages (Apple)
Apple App Store for iPhone – Angry Birds (Clickgamer.com)
BlackBerry App World – BeBuzz – LED Colors and Audible Reminders (Bellshare)
Google Android Market – Beautiful Widgets (LevelUp Studio)
Nokia Ovi Store – ToonWarz (Polarbit)
Palm App Catalog – mCraig – Mobile Craigslist Browser (SplashData)
Windows Marketplace for Mobile – Meon (Manbolo)

The Apple iPhone figures for the dominance of games in the Apple iPhone App Sto re prove just how good a games platform the iPhone is. It’s a shame that Apple have shied away from this market. If they produced a games console then we think they’d have a worldwide winner.
[ad name=”Google Text half banner advert “]