Apple shifts two billion Apps in 14 months

The new iPhone 3GS - a picture that describes it all
The new iPhone 3GS - a picture that describes it all

Apple has announced its iPod touch and iPhone users have downloaded over two billion applications from its App Store.

This is a frankly startling number, especially when you consider the App Store was only opened for business in July 2008.

The number of applications downloaded hit 300 million by December that year, crossed the billion mark in April 2009, and had hit 1.5 billion in time for the App Store's first anniversary.

Broad audience

There are more than 50 million iPod touch and iPhone users in the world at the moment, meaning Apple's library of 85,000 applications has a pretty broad audience.

"The rate of App Store downloads continues to accelerate with users downloading a staggering two billion apps in just over a year, including more than half a billion apps this quarter alone", said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO (you may have heard of him before).

"The App Store has reinvented what you can do with a mobile handheld device, and our users are clearly loving it".

The App Store is also starting to segment too, with some applications only working on the iPhone 3GS thanks to advanced hardware.

But that doesn't look like it will stop the rate of downloading from the App Store, which will probably cross three billion by 2010.

Gareth Beavis
Formerly Global Editor in Chief

Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grown with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.