iPhone vs Android: Monetization Capabilities. iPhone ARPU Is 3.5X Of Android

Deepak Abbot heads Mobile Growth at Times Internet. He has previously worked with companies like Paytm, Reliance Entertainment Digital, Zapak & Satyam computers.

It started off as a simple tweet highlighting the number of apps available in each App Store that led to some interesting discussion with @anuj_tandon & @mananshah212 here.

The conversation highlighted the monetization capabilities of each App Store which got me to collect & analyze the data shown below.

This table lists down the key numbers for Apple App Store & Google Play Store which further highlights the monetization capabilities of iPhone vs Android. The data has been collected from multiple sources (list at the end) to arrive at this table:

It is self explanatory and clearly highlights the superiority of the iPhone over Android from monetization POV.
However, Android is at par with iPhone on Ad revenue capabilities if you look at Avg Ad Revenue per App metric.

It took me 5 hours to collect all the data & another 3 hours to analyze and prepare this report. Since I have over 90% of my visitors from India, I decided to invest another 2 hours to prepare a similar report for India. While some of the data was not directly available (IAP), I extrapolated it based on several reports on IAP vs Ad revenue share in India market.

ARPUs in India are abysmal as expected. CAC has gone up in India with no corresponding increase in ARPUs, thus reducing the net returns drastically.

P.S. Active Phones = Phones currently in circulation (80% of total sold)

IAP Revenues = Developer’s Share paid by Google & Apple

The data above may not be 100% accurate, but it gives an accurate indication of the capabilities of each platform.

I will be happy to hear your feedback on this. Feel free to comment here or tag me on twitter @deepakabbot or mail me at dabbot@gmail.com.

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