Apple's Popular Apps Not Exclusive to iPhone: Analysis

Apple has the largest app store by a long shot: Currently i Phone users can choose from 350,000 apps. But how many apps do people really use--and should the size of the Apple App Store sway your next smart phone purchase? It shouldn't.

Analysis of the top apps on competing smartphone app stores reveals that the majority of the iPhone's most popular apps are also available on Android, Windows Phone 7, Palm, RIM BlackBerry, and Nokia phones. This dispels the smartphone buyers' myth that claims: "The bigger the app store, the better the phone."

After reviewing the top 35 iPhone apps, it was found that a larger store doesn't always win, especially when it comes to core and popular apps. For example, Google's Android Market, currently a little more than half the size of Apple's App Store (200,000 apps), has the same selection of popular apps--with the exception of games. Even in the newer and less-populated app stores such as Microsoft's Windows Phone Marketplace (11,500 apps), you can get most of the same top apps.

Compared Apple's App Store with Google's Android Market, Research In Motion's BlackBerry App World, Nokia's Ovi Store, Palm's App Catalog, and Microsoft's Windows Phone Marketplace.

Started with Apple's App Store list of the most downloaded apps of all time. From that list, we selected the top 10 paid apps, paid games, free apps, and free games, removed the duplicates, and added a couple of all-time favorites--ending up with a list of the 35 most downloaded iOS apps of all time. Compared that list with available apps for competing smartphones.

App Category Breakdown

Popular app categories (click to zoom)Popular app categories. Image: Nielsen Media Research Games: If you're addicted to Angry Birds, the only big no-no for you would be the BlackBerry platform (the game is arriving on Windows Phone 7 in May). Several other prominent titles--such as Bejeweled, Doodle Jump, and Flight Control--are also available for most platforms; iOS has a few exclusives, such as Cro-Mag Rally and Cut The Rope (copycat games aside).

Business apps: Serious smartphone shoppers seeking serious apps have a much wider choice. For example, if you want to view and edit Microsoft Office documents, you can get an app for that on all the platforms in this comparison. One exception is the Bump contact-sharing app, which is available only for iOS and Android.

Music and audio: If you want to listen to online radio, Pandora is available for all platforms, with the exception of Nokia and Windows Phone 7 handsets. There you can get Slacker Radio as an alternative. If you want to chat with Skype buddies, you can also achieve that across all platforms, via an official app or Fring (an equivalent).

Productivity and social media: Monitoring calories or tracking your flight? Check--you can do so with iOS, BlackBerry, Android, Nokia, Palm, and Windows Phone 7. Facebook and Twitter? Check. Weather and Yelp? Check. Bible reading? No problem. You can pretty much find the same or equivalent app on all modern smartphones, regardless of brand and operating system.

Entertainment: Your options narrow a bit when you are looking for other popular apps. For example, you can't get the official Amazon Kindle app on a Nokia or Palm smartphone. Netflix is limited to iOS and Windows Phone 7. And Flixster and IMDb are not available on Nokia smartphones.