2016 was a great year to be an Apple app developer. A record breaking 12 months saw developers earn $20 billion (£16.2bn), more than a 40 percent increase from 2015.
Not only that, the App Store welcomed 2017 in style as New Year’s Day became its busiest ever single day with nearly $240 million in purchases (£195m), capping off a record holiday season during which users spent $3 billion (£2.4bn) in December alone.
Developers have now earned over $60 billion (£48bn) since the App Store launched in 2008, as apps across iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV and Mac have played an ever-more central role in people’s lives.
“2016 was a record-shattering year for the App Store, generating $20 billion for developers, and 2017 is off to a great start with Jan. 1 as the single biggest day ever on the App Store,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s head of Worldwide Marketing.
“We want to thank our entire developer community for the many innovative apps they have created — which together with our products — help to truly enrich people’s lives.”
Nintendo’s Super Mario Run was the most downloaded app globally on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day, after the hit app had made history in December by being downloaded more than 40 million times in the four days after its release.
Super Mario Run also made it onto the list of 2016’s top 10 most downloaded apps worldwide, with Niantic’s Pokémon Go predictably taking the top spot after quickly becoming a global phenomenon during the summer.
This marks the second record-breaking Christmas period in a row for the App Store, which now has over 2.2 million applications available in 155 countries, with the US, China, Japan and the UK being the top-grossing markets.
The increases sales have likely been helped by the two major shake-ups Apple carried out last year, first implementing a new revenue-sharing model with developers and then launching a quality drive to remove unsupported apps and ban long titles.
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