Analyzing Apple’s All-Time Top Apps Lists

With the iOS App Store passing 25 billion downloads, Apple has published all-time rankings of the top 25 free and paid iPhone and iPad apps. (Via Daring Fireball.)

Digging in…

• Angry Birds is 3 of the top 10 paid iPhone apps — nos. 1, 5, and 8. And 3 of the top 25 free iPhone apps. And 3 of the top 10 paid iPad apps. And 3 of the top 25 free iPad apps. Just incredible.
• 3 of the top 12 paid iPad apps are “office” apps — Apple’s iWork suite of Pages (no. 1), Numbers (no. 11), and Keynote (no. 12). Clearly there is demand for these types of apps, and Microsoft Office is missing out.
• None of the top apps are “location based services” — unless you count MotionX GPS, Google Earth, or Groupon.
• 4 of the top 10 paid iPhone apps — Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Words With Friends, and Angry Birds Rio — also have free versions in the top 25 free iPhone apps.
• 7 of the top 10 free iPhone apps have blue as their dominant icon color. (Only one, Netflix, has no blue at all.)
• Instagram, a relatively young app, made it to no. 19 in free iPhone apps. That’s pretty impressive. And Facebook‘s newish iPad app already made it to no. 17 in the free iPad apps. (Two third-party Facebook apps also made it into the top 25 free and paid iPad apps, reflecting the void Facebook left unfilled for so long.)
• I’m surprised to see Bump so high in the top free iPhone apps (no. 14). Do people actually use this app? Have never seen it. (Update: Apparently!)
• iBooks seems to have been excluded from this list. Or is the Kindle iPad app — no. 5 in the free iPad apps list — really the only one in the top 25? Seems like a strange exclusion.
• Average current price of the top 25 all-time paid iPhone apps: $1.51. Average current price of the top 25 all-time paid iPad apps: $5.59.
• Would love to have seen top grossing lists, too. (And, while I’m dreaming, a “highest engagement” list.)

Also: A look at the Mac App Store, 100 million downloads later