An update by Microsoft on current trends in app downloads from the Windows Phone Store and the Windows Store showed that in-app purchase are now taking up 55% of all revenue taken in by app developers from those storefronts.
The new numbers, which cover the January to March 2015 quarter, show that in-app purchases are becoming more important for developers than getting revenue from paid apps. Microsoft stated:
"While IAP continues to grow in total revenue month over month, we saw an even larger spike in IAP revenue share over the last quarter, driven by introduction of new apps since our last post such as Age of Empires: Castle Siege, Age of Sparta, Asphalt 8: Airborne, Candy Crush Saga, Dragon Mania Legends, My Talking Angela, and The Sims FreePlay that rely on the IAP revenue model."
The US is still the biggest market for both Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone apps, However, Microsoft noted that there was a sizable increase in Windows Phone app downloads in the past quarter from India, Brazil and Vietnam. That's in part due to the recently launched option of carrier billing to pay for apps and in-app transactions. Microsoft stated:
"With low credit card penetration in these markets, the addition of the carrier billing option has brought subscribers previously unable to purchase from global app stores into the Windows Phone Store."
80% of all Windows Phone Store app downloads come from Windows Phone 8.1, with 93% of Windows Store downloads are for Windows 8.1 devices, according to Microsoft. 68% of all Windows Phone app downloads are to low-memory devices, which are defined as 256MB or less of RAM for Windows 7.x phones and 512MB or lower for Windows Phone 8.x devices.
Not surprisingly, Games is the most popular app category in both stores, while ones in the Social category have the highest ratio of downloads per app, although Microsoft notes that the Photos catagory is a close second in the Windows Phone Store.
Source: Microsoft
