Apple revenue – earned through the commission charged at each sale – may have reached $ 8.5 billion. The company announced that the Apple's App Store Sales generated more than $20 billion in revenue for developers.
In total, the store's revenue reached $28.5 billion. Apple took the rest of the amount, corresponding to the 30% commission on sales.
In early 2016, Apple did not reveal exact revenue numbers. The company limited itself to say that app sales had exceeded $ 20 billion, with this result the expectation is that revenue earned by developers for the year was $ 14 billion.
Apple's revenue from its app store you have grown year over year globally. The business has become more and more important, as the company's main product sales of iPhone fell last year.
Apple's global performance
The company's performance has been better especially in China, currently its third market in terms of revenue. China was previously the second largest market for the technology giant in 2015, after which Europe regained second place. The growing smartphone market, the launch of the iPhone 8, and the appreciation of the Chinese yuan are key factors that helped Apple increase its revenues in China.
The United States maintains its position as Apple's largest market, generating revenue of $ 32.0 billion.
Apple's revenue from Europe rose 3.0 percent to $ 10.5 billion, with revenues from the Asia-Pacific region up 8.0 percent to $ 5.9 billion. Its revenues from Japan recorded a significant increase from 20.0% to 5.8 billion dollars.
The arrival of new games and apps that are based on monthly subscription models has also boosted Apple's earnings last year.
Most downloaded games and apps
According to Apple, games represent the majority of apps downloaded by users. Of every four downloads done in the App Store, three are games. The most downloaded app in the App Store Over the last year was the augmented reality game Pokémon Go, the game reached 40 million downloads in the first four days.
Developed by Niantic in partnership with the Pokémon Company and released in July last year, Pokémon Go mixes the characters from the 1990s series with innovative technologies (such as augmented reality and geolocation) and has become one of the top highlights of 2016.
It is not surprising that mobile games are the most downloaded since they represent the 50% of the world video gaming market. Asia is the largest mobile gaming market, generating a profit of $ 24.8 billion in 2016; In contrast, North America and Europe produced $ 6.9 billion and $ 5.7 billion, respectively.
Americans spent 5 percent more in 2016 than in 2015 playing mobile games, and companies believe that amount will keep rising. American gamers install more apps and engage more with mobile games than with online live TV, videos or podcasts. On average, playing a mobile game is a more frequent behavior than consuming other types of online content (6 times per week vs. 5 times per week).
America is the one country with more iOS gamers than on Android. Although Google's OS represents 78% of the world gaming market, iOS keeps generating more revenue. In America, developers earned an average of 45 percent more from a player using iOS than Android; However, in China, Android gamers spend 8 times more money than iOS players.
Apps that generate more revenue
Excluding games, Spotify obtained the largest amount of revenue in the App Store in 2016. Line came second, a Japanese messaging app which includes a number of paid services and mobile commerce.
In total, the App Store offers as many as 2.2 million apps available for both the iPhone and the iPad tablet. Users with multiple devices can download the same applications for all their devices without having to pay for them again.
In the top 10, most apps are content applications, especially music and video content, which usually charge monthly fees to ensure them recurring revenue. In addition to Spotify, the list includes Netflix, HBO Now, Hulu, Pandora and the Chinese apps: iQIYI and Inke. Tinder, the popular casual dating application and the Japanese Line Manga, complete this ranking.
Apple App Store Sales
Earlier this year, the Apple App Store hit a new sales record for a single day. On January 10th 2017, the app sales recorded a total of $ 240 million. According to Apple, monthly sales in the App Store hit $ 3 billion only in December 2016. That month corresponds to the launch of the game Super Mario Run, which was the most downloaded app around the world at Christmas and New Year's Eve.
The company claims that since the creation of the App Store in 2008 app developers have already earned more than $ 60 billion worldwide – who typically get 70% of revenue, with the remaining 30% going to Apple – saw their earnings rise by about 40% in each of the last three years.