Report finds Windows Phone 7 Marketplace apps 50% cheaper on average than Apple’s App Store

By Tom Warren, on 26th Nov 10 8:38 am with 5 Comments

A recent study by Distimo, an app store analytics firm, suggests that on average Windows Phone 7 applications are the cheapest of all stores.

The study looked at the iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, Ovi, Palm, Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7 application stores. The study (PDF) found that the Windows Phone 7 marketplace is the cheapest of all stores with an average price of $1.95. Apple’s iPhone applications averages at $4 per application. The report also notes that Games is the most popular category in the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace.

The Windows Phone 7 Marketplace launched on October 21, 2010 and has grown to nearly 3,000 applications to date. Distimo notes that Microsoft’s Windows Marketplace for Mobile 6.5 only gathered 1,350 applications after launching over a year ago on October 6, 2009. Games are more popular on Windows Phone 7 than they are on Windows Mobile 6.5 according to the study. The report also found that applications are significantly more expensive in the Windows Marketplace for Mobile (6.x). The Windows Phone 7 Marketplace closely mirrors prices in other stores.

Games dominate the popular paid applications side of Windows Phone 7. All ten popular paid applications are games ranging from $2.99 to $6.99. Microsoft also has six applications in the top 10 most popular applications. These range from the YouTube application to Xbox LIVE Extras.

Microsoft revealed this week that it now has 15,000 app developers for Windows Phone 7. The software giant also expects the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace to offer 3,000 applications by the end of the week.

Image Credit: Distimo.com

  • Ian

    Unfortunately this is not true of the games, which are far more expensive on wp7.

    • GP007

      Isn’t that just the Xbox Live ones? The higher price for those is a given since to add the Live features you have extra hoops to jump through. The non-Live games are pretty cheap though.

  • Doug Jnr

    Of course average cost of iOS apps are more….they are better. Average cost of German cars are more too.

    • GP007

      heh, better, if you say so. IMO WP7 apps are off to a good start compared to both Apple and Android apps at the start as far as quality goes.

  • Anonymous

    There are plenty of expensive, specialized apps on iOS and Android. not so on WinPho