Have you ever wonderd why iOs has more apps than Android

[mikedt]

I've heard this a good number of times, but I really wonder where the proof is!

It seems the thinking goes something like this: "People who buy Apple toys do so because they're more affluent and they can afford them, hence they can also spend money on apps."

But MY version goes like this: "People who buy Android devices do so because they want Android as their OS. Cost isn't the issue."

I'd say that's very much the way in countries like the US and UK. Basically where paid Android apps are easily available from Play. And iOS devices(along with high-end Androids) tend to be more easily affordable because they're usually subsidised by the carriers. iPhone 5S 16GB in the US is $199 vs the $850 here in China....on the Apple website. And not really the luxury(Gucci shoes) item it is here.

If one can afford a new iPhone 5C or 5S or Samsung S4 in the PRC, it usually means one is quite well monied. Remember the story about the student who was refused employment just because he had an iPhone? BTW a friend of mine recently ordered a Samsung S4 from Hong Kong, just because he got a government job.

 

[mrex]

Not even close.

GooglePlay has over 1million apps in their store: http://mashable.com/2013/07/24/google-play-1-million/

But honestly, i dont care if there are 20 000 apps, 100 000 apps or million - most of them are useless, copy of each other etc. Same as AppleStore has major of zombies: http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23240971

Both marketplaces should clean the whole system and let only most of downloaded apps to the store at first. Then the line is drawn, after the line only apps, that isnt there already, are allowed to pass the line. If there is a quite similar, almost identical one in the store, the new app has no right to cross the line to the store. The new app must have clearly something new features compairing to the old one in the store. If it's similar, identical, has no new feature or easier to use, why we need two or even multiple same apps? It's ridiculous! And finally we would have a store from where you can actually find some cool and handy apps you need.... Or if they are not going to make anything to make the store better, we have a store like AppleStore, that is full of zombies!

 

[wyndslash]

Definitely quality over quantity

 

[mrex]

i spend money on apps the same way i did in iOS. most 'free' Android apps come with malware or adware inside so i avoid it at all costs. the only real change so far is ditching the $1.29 per song price in iTunes for any song i want for $8 per month

I dont think that most of the free android apps come with a malware (if you get it from googleplay), but they do have adware: some of them are just ads some are collecting info as much as they can. This is also the reason, why im only using paid apps nowadays. I have removed almost every free apps, and only using the paid apps.

If some app has ridiculous rights to do things on my phone, i wont install it. For example the calc app doesnt need an access to my address book, if it askes it, then the app is no-needed-one and I find better one. Everyone should give a feedback in the GooglePlay even just to say "Why does your app need an access to..." for that developers should start to think about the rights more.

 

[64MarcoV]

You need apps on a iPhone to get the thing working as it should be.:alberteinstein: On the other hand my S3 worked well out of the box, the only apps i use are games.

Yesterday i upgraded my iPad2. With the original ios it was not possible to watch youtube movies within the Safari browser. They had an app for that ! :thumbdown:

 

[nj02vette]

I think the article has some things right, but some of the conclusions are a bit off.

Yes, there are more 1st run apps available on iOS. But it was only a few years ago when iOS was dominate. It had a large phone marketshare and 99% tablet marketshare.

How the winds have shifted. Android accounts for 80% and tablets 65% of new devices. That's a complete change. But software development takes time. And company decisions to support one OS or the other can happen years before.

What we are seeing now is companies making the switch, but it takes time to catch up. Fragmentation and support are real issues, but minor compared to the decision to leave the majority of your customers without an app. Companies that refuse to support Android may soon find themselves on the outside and damage their brand.

 

[nickdalzell]

Actually even with the Play Store i got Airpushed. the Play Store has a new policy that apps that include it are banned, but that only worked when the Dev said it had Airpush in the app's description. nowadays, they hide the malware in the apk and you won't know until after you install and try to run it, and by then it's too late. i just avoid any of that by paying for the app if possible and unlock all of the features as well. I'm not one of those FOSS tightwads who expects everything to be free

 

[MoodyBlues]

I think the article has some things right, but some of the conclusions are a bit off.

Yes, there are more 1st run apps available on iOS. But it was only a few years ago when iOS was dominate. It had a large phone marketshare and 99% tablet marketshare.

How the winds have shifted. Android accounts for 80% and tablets 65% of new devices. That's a complete change. But software development takes time. And company decisions to support one OS or the other can happen years before.

I absolutely agree with everything you're saying, nj. But here's where I have an issue:

What we are seeing now is companies making the switch, but it takes time to catch up.

But what about when it's a BRAND-NEW app they're releasing? For example, I [shamelessly admit that I] watch Big Brother every summer. Episode after episode, Julie Chen says to go to cbs.com/app to get your app that lets you view full episodes and do a bunch of other wonderful things. Great, I said to myself! And headed over to install it. And you know what I found?

Talk about adding insult to injury--they have a window$ app, but not Android?!

Fragmentation and support are real issues, but minor compared to the decision to leave the majority of your customers without an app. Companies that refuse to support Android may soon find themselves on the outside and damage their brand.

Yes indeed.

 

[nickdalzell]

there are a ton of CBS apps in the Play Store. what makes this one so special?

 

[MoodyBlues]

there are a ton of CBS apps in the Play Store. what makes this one so special?

I have no idea--since I can't install the one CBS keeps hyping!

 

[Rush]

Hopefully one day we'll look back at this discussion and say 'wow'.... "I remember back when.. when iOS was the platform to first get some of coolest apps". :knuddel:

 

[sfbloodbrother]

My guess is thats its a lot easier to develop for iOS than it is for Android, because there is limited optimization, and hardware to develop for.

 

[mikedt]

My guess is thats its a lot easier to develop for iOS than it is for Android, because there is limited optimization, and hardware to develop for.

I wonder if it's really any harder than developing PC software. You have a minimum stated spec, like hardware requirements and OS version. And anything that doesn't meet those specs just doesn't run it and is not supported.

 

[out of ideas]

I've heard this a good number of times, but I really wonder where the proof is!

It seems the thinking goes something like this: "People who buy Apple toys do so because they're more affluent and they can afford them, hence they can also spend money on apps."

But MY version goes like this: "People who buy Android devices do so because they want Android as their OS. Cost isn't the issue."

Ditto for the misconceptions about me and my fellow Linux users. It's not that we can't afford window$ crap, it's that we don't WANT window$ crap! :laugh:

lol. keep that crap away!

yeah for many more informed users its a choice thing. but i think a lot of people tend to just kind of go out and buy a phone.

i tinker around a bit making apps on android and looked around at the apple situation and it does seem more revenue comes from the istore. lots of blogs from developers and hanging around XDA and related sites i come across that.

http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/17/apple-and-googles-app-stores-now-neck-and-neck-except-on-the-metric-that-matters-most-to-developers-revenue/

a revenue specific one off techcrunch where supposedly apple gets double(or more) the revenue.
and this a similar one to the link in the op i came across a couple weeks ago
Startups Apparently Do Not Care That Android Is Better | TechCrunch

My guess is thats its a lot easier to develop for iOS than it is for Android, because there is limited optimization, and hardware to develop for.

I wonder if it's really any harder than developing PC software. You have a minimum stated spec, like hardware requirements and OS version. And anything that doesn't meet those specs just doesn't run it and is not supported.

i guess it really depends on your skill set, as they use different languages, but i know some Java and find if more straight foward the c#, but thats probably just cuz i dove into java by choice. according to the techcrunch survey i posted, most more experienced users just choose iphone as their personal phone and development language, so thats what gets done.

I'd say its probably about similar to just develop, but covering every android device is obviously much harder with so many manufacturers and screen sizes and specs.

and yeah mike, it is similar to that. Like if you just want the ICS+ actionbar, your app wont work on Gingerbread. or if your apps needs certain sensors, or a front camera, they won't be supported if your phone dont have it. Thats why you can go on the app store and certain apps arent "compatible with your device" and you get left out.

People seeking to get as many users as possible will wisely use external libraries for compatibility, but many things aren't going to work unless you have at least ICS these days.

The money and familiarity are still the main factors in apple first development though. some do choose android, but you can see many games and things like instagram and vine and twitter music being done on iphone first. even though android is killing it with market share and device shipments, the money is still the bottom line

but Android still rules!

 

[EarlyMon]

Watch "Google I/O 2013 - Android Design for UI Developers" on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jl3-lzlzOJI

Watch "Google I/O 2013 - What's New in Android Developer Tools" on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmv1dTnhLH4

Watch "Top 10 Google I/O 2013 Announcements!" on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onldzSzdqlM

The truth is out there.

 

[nickdalzell]

lol. keep that crap away!

yeah for many more informed users its a choice thing. but i think a lot of people tend to just kind of go out and buy a phone.

i tinker around a bit making apps on android and looked around at the apple situation and it does seem more revenue comes from the istore. lots of blogs from developers and hanging around XDA and related sites i come across that.

http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/17/apple-and-googles-app-stores-now-neck-and-neck-except-on-the-metric-that-matters-most-to-developers-revenue/

a revenue specific one off techcrunch where supposedly apple gets double(or more) the revenue.
and this a similar one to the link in the op i came across a couple weeks ago
Startups Apparently Do Not Care That Android Is Better | TechCrunch





i guess it really depends on your skill set, as they use different languages, but i know some Java and find if more straight foward the c#, but thats probably just cuz i dove into java by choice. according to the techcrunch survey i posted, most more experienced users just choose iphone as their personal phone and development language, so thats what gets done.

I'd say its probably about similar to just develop, but covering every android device is obviously much harder with so many manufacturers and screen sizes and specs.

and yeah mike, it is similar to that. Like if you just want the ICS+ actionbar, your app wont work on Gingerbread. or if your apps needs certain sensors, or a front camera, they won't be supported if your phone dont have it. Thats why you can go on the app store and certain apps arent "compatible with your device" and you get left out.

People seeking to get as many users as possible will wisely use external libraries for compatibility, but many things aren't going to work unless you have at least ICS these days.

The money and familiarity are still the main factors in apple first development though. some do choose android, but you can see many games and things like instagram and vine and twitter music being done on iphone first. even though android is killing it with market share and device shipments, the money is still the bottom line

but Android still rules!

The 'This application is not compatible with your device' has nothing to do with permissions/needed hardware. that alert is 99% of the time incorrect and i am hoping for the day that Google either removes that 'feature' or gives us the option to take our chances and download the apk anyway.

one such false positive is the NBA Jam app from EA Games. it tells me my NEXUS 10 is not compatible. yet it installs fine on my Galaxy S3 and a chinese cheapie Trio tablet, something is wrong here. since i can easily pull the apk from the Trio, i can still install it but most folks shouldn't have to root their phones to make a game work just because Google thinks it's not going to work. the Nexus 10 has more than enough spec to run that game.

Another false positive was the temporary issue where Nexus 7's couldn't run Google+, the same alert in the Play Store came up.

 

[out of ideas]

The 'This application is not compatible with your device' has nothing to do with permissions/needed hardware. that alert is 99% of the time incorrect and i am hoping for the day that Google either removes that 'feature' or gives us the option to take our chances and download the apk anyway.

one such false positive is the NBA Jam app from EA Games. it tells me my NEXUS 10 is not compatible. yet it installs fine on my Galaxy S3 and a chinese cheapie Trio tablet, something is wrong here. since i can easily pull the apk from the Trio, i can still install it but most folks shouldn't have to root their phones to make a game work just because Google thinks it's not going to work. the Nexus 10 has more than enough spec to run that game.

Another false positive was the temporary issue where Nexus 7's couldn't run Google+, the same alert in the Play Store came up.

It's actually supposed to be 100% based on that. the play store is just super buggy the last few months.

developers can set various this like minSdkVersion, or minimum screen size. so an ICS only app wont install on GB. you can try sideloading it, but youre gona get parse errors.

<uses-feature> is another option you can set in the manifest

<uses-feature> | Android Developers

Google Play and Feature-Based Filtering

Google Play filters the applications that are visible to users, so that users can see and download only those applications that are compatible with their devices. One of the ways it filters applications is by feature compatibility.
To determine an application's feature compatibility with a given user's device, Google Play compares:

• Features required by the application

 

[redpill2016]

iOS has more apps because iPhone users spend more money on IAPs per capita than any other mobile OS. They are a cash cow, so developers get it on iOS asap.

 

[nickdalzell]

i don't get parse errors unless i'm trying to install something requiring a higher version of Android. the Nexus 10 has the most recent version. many times, even devs have sideloaded the APK whenever Google tried to tell them something wasn't compatible. it worked fine. if Google won't remove that feature (they didn't always have it after all) they should at least tell us WHY they think it's not compatible. root users can then, if they wish, edit their build.prop to comply, or average users can know why it won't work for them.

I have the same problem with 'this isn't compatible with your device' (without a reason) as i do for vague 'an error occurred' messages (where they don't tell me WHAT the error was, so i can even diagnose it!)

but something is very off when a game that runs fine on some generic Chinese garbage suddenly isn't compatible with the most high-end tablet from Google.

 

[trophynuts]

no one is going to mention the fragmentation of Android as being a possible reason also?

If you're developing for Apple you're probably only worried about one version of IOS.

With Android we all know the story. You have to make your app work with about 3 different versions of Android and on a TON of hardware combinations.

 

[nickdalzell]

why isn't Linux a problem? you'd think with over a bazillion distros out there, that fragmentation would be exponentially worse than with Android...

 

[mikedt]

why isn't Linux a problem? you'd think with over a bazillion distros out there, that fragmentation would be exponentially worse than with Android...

Why isn't Windows a problem? You'd think with all those bazillions of PCs out there, in all shapes and sizes. There should be terrible software fragmentation, but there isn't.

 

[anmire]

I feel like people focus too much on these "popular apps", seeing as how every app *essentially, not all* on ios has a counterpart on android. It may be branded differently and it probably is free. Yet somehow, it always comes down to..."oh, this app isn't supported!" When in fact it is, but by some independent hard working programmer running under a different name. Sorry, I just don't get it.

Also, fragmentation may be a problem, but as stated in the article "things are getting better" meaning, code is being standardized amongst most of those devices.

 

[out of ideas]

i don't get parse errors unless i'm trying to install something requiring a higher version of Android. the Nexus 10 has the most recent version. many times, even devs have sideloaded the APK whenever Google tried to tell them something wasn't compatible. it worked fine. if Google won't remove that feature (they didn't always have it after all) they should at least tell us WHY they think it's not compatible. root users can then, if they wish, edit their build.prop to comply, or average users can know why it won't work for them.

I have the same problem with 'this isn't compatible with your device' (without a reason) as i do for vague 'an error occurred' messages (where they don't tell me WHAT the error was, so i can even diagnose it!)

but something is very off when a game that runs fine on some generic Chinese garbage suddenly isn't compatible with the most high-end tablet from Google.

like i said, the play store has been buggy for most of the year. sometimes it shows apps i never installed as myapps, and sometimes doesnt show stuff im running.

you have to realize google is trying to cover the least common denominator. 50 people saying "this is actually compatible but it says its not" is better than 1,000 saying "it let me download this but it wont work".

probably 90% of parse errors occur for the wrong version, but there are several other reasons.

Also, build.prop edits wont always work, ive seen some people having to get around things by copying the needed feature xmls to /etc/permissions.

 

[starxpilot]

Interesting, I thought it was because they won over the unwashed masses of users when the first iPhone came out. Then the quote, "There's an app for that", came to light. I had never considered it would be this 'complicated'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szrsfeyLzyg

*A representative told me that exact quote, "Unwashed Masses" that really caught my eye, it is nice to know Apple's point of view on the world* I love that they openly admit it and will do what is needed to ensure the cash cow continues.

Given the price differences, it's only natural that users would want a 'one-in-all' solution, and that starts with Apple since the devices hardly have any differences, same hardware, same use. No testing for devices, no different tiers of upgrades, simple, basic...and for some reason, white. I would not want to carry a big, white, shiny, expensive toy. I would sooner pick up a droid, customize it my way, and learn from within, through trial and error, and of course, through communities such as this one that I'm posting with.

It is a shame that the application availability hampers progress, but, it's somewhat of a small price to pay, for flexibility in choosing the phone you want. You can have one made out of a material that's reserved for military vehicles, or you can have one that can survive being dropped in the water...or you can have one that's so delicate, a simple drop will crack it. So many options and differences, but it gives users a choice.

(I still remember my first Android, 2.0, and while being warned there weren't as many apps on the Market as it was called back then, that eventually, it would multiply beyond my knowledge. The angry technician told me to give it a shot, given my budget, and to learn from it, as Android would 'evolve' in a few years. I believe he was right.)