A study published by Analysis Group and relayed by Apple shows that small developers on the App Store managed to grow their revenues by 71 per cent between 2020 and 2022 by reaching new customers around the world. According to the study, small developers were even able to outpace larger developers, in terms of growth, despite having fewer resources.
The study defines small developers as those who earned less than $1 million per year and saw fewer than 1 million annual downloads. Globally, this cohort grew its revenue by 71 per cent between 2020 and 2022 and in the US, this figure stood at 83 per cent.
Some other key stats that Apple published include that 90% of all developers on the App Store are small developers and that 40% of app creators who make more than $1 million were not even on the App Store five years ago or were making less than $10,000.
In 2022, thousands of new developers put apps on the App Store. Of these, 25 per cent came from Europe, 23 per cent came from China, 14 per cent were from the US, 4 per cent were from Japan and 35 per cent were from other areas including South Korea, India, and Brazil.
As more people get online in the coming years, the customer base for app developers will only grow bigger. According to Exploding Topics, there is still massive room for smartphones, and consequently, apps, to grow. In China, just 64 per cent have a smartphone and the figure is even lower in places like India (46 per cent) and Nigeria (37 per cent). As more people get phones in these areas, the revenues of app developers could grow further.