The one thing that's not possible to test is when a download is uninstalled, which affects this metric significantly.<p>I find that I install a lot of android apps, but uninstall the vast majority of them. My iOS device, on the other hand, gets fewer downloads, but virtually all are paid and virtually all have stayed for good.<p>After owning 3 android devices, iPod touch and an iPad 2, I've come to the conclusion that the iOS apps are substantially better. To balance the field I have to download many android apps to find the best ones, which has been a challenge because most of the android and amazon markets are complete crap.<p>One example... I use audiogalaxy for streaming music. The iOS version is perfection, it streams well, UI has no glitches that I've found and it uses the iOS dev patterns well. The android version has many UI issues, it's sluggish and buffering works, but not as well as iOS. In addition, the menu system is convoluted on android making it very difficult to navigate. This is just one example, there are many android apps that have these issues (same thing with beyondpod).<p>I am impressed with android numbers (those of us who bought G1's never thought this day would come), but I don't think it's translating into more sales. Android still has a long way to go before it catches up with iOS, imo.
As an Android developer, I love this trend. It's amazing to be able to reach such a large and growing audience in the mobile world without having to live inside Apple's ecosystem. It's also exciting that the high-end Android phones out now are increasingly awesome. I hope this translates into an increase in paid apps' success, given that more users with more money seem to be using Android.
It seems the number of Android ad impressions has doubled over iOS ad impressions, too:<p><a href="http://phandroid.com/2011/10/25/millennial-android-doubles-ios-impressions/" rel="nofollow">http://phandroid.com/2011/10/25/millennial-android-doubles-i...</a>
ABI is trying to sell the report, so they use a bait headline and press release.<p>A little digging on the report, and you find out it does not include iPod Touch or iPad in the numbers, pretty much making it worthless.
If true, this has been a while coming, but I'm taking the source with a grain of salt. It makes no mention of methodology for data gathering. Apple don't, in general, share their data. Nor do Google. It doesn't mention of what a "Mobile App download" is. Are iPod Touch and iPad included in the stats (which make more > 50% of iOS installations)? In app purchase data? What about Amazon App Store?<p>Of course, the only way to get the even skimpy details is to cough up a price (that isn't even available until you log in). The rest of their site seems to indicate that "Mobile" means phone handsets, which are <i>not</i> the only source of installs for iOS and Android.<p>Edit: I had a small rant about "analysts", the plague of our industry, but decided it didn't add anything (I hope I'm preaching to the converted).
I would like to see data on developer profits from paid/ad based apps though. I wonder if this may be due to more free apps on the Android Marketplace.
There are an infinite number of metrics to compare devices. But this is a pretty general one.<p>You could also do profits, users, developers, developer income, apps available. Give it up, it's arbitrary and you're not doing much more than justifying the conclusions you've already made about the platform.