Mobile app developer and analysis firm asymco predicts that downloads via Apple’s App Store will exceed downloads from its iTunes music store by year-end. asymco highlights the fact that Apple’s recent announcement that the App Store has reached 6.5 billion downloads means that the store has reached the same total downloads in 2.2 years (26 months) that iTunes took five years to achieve (see graph showing downloads indexed to the same launch date). This growth pattern suggests that both stores will hit around 13 billion downloads before the year is over with App Store downloads expected to exceed iTunes music downloads shortly after.

The stronger growth in apps downloads is perhaps unsurprising considering their wider appeal and generally cheaper cost compared to music downloads.  According to asymco, the average App Store download costs US$0.29 compared to US$1.26 for music track downloads via iTunes. But asymco claims that slowing growth in Apple’s music download business is being more than offset by the growth in apps.

Apple has been famously tight-lipped on how much money it makes from apps. However, based on 17 million downloads a day at US$0.29 each, asymco calculates that spending at the App Store will hit US$1.8 billion this year and could hit US$2 billion by its third year. This is twice what Apple CEO Steve Jobs predicted when the store launched in 2008 when he said the business would be a “US$1 billion marketplace at some point in time.”

Source: asymco (September 2010)