Apple App Store Analysis: Here's The Difference Between The iPad And The iPhone

What's the difference between Apple's new iPad tablet and its iPhone?

Based on a quick analysis of the apps people are buying on the devices, it's pretty simple: The iPhone and iPod touch are for games. The iPad is for a lot more. And people are spending a lot more (per app) on iPad apps than iPhone apps.

• 82% of the top 50 iPhone/iPod touch apps are Games, versus 36% of the top 50 iPad apps.

• The top iPad app categories among the top 50 are Games (36%), Content (28%, includes news, video), Productivity (20%), and Utilities (16%, includes weather).

• The top iPhone app categories among the top 50 are Games (82%, includes gag apps) and Utilities (18%, includes weather, social networking).

• The average top-25 paid iPhone app was $1.51, versus $5.79 on the iPad (almost 4X difference).

(How'd we get these numbers? We looked at the top 25 paid and top 25 free apps for each system, thus the "top 50." We also recategorized some apps that we thought were tagged with the wrong category. And we took some liberties merging "games" and "entertainment" apps, etc.)

To be sure: Obviously, there's a lot more going on peoples' iPads and iPhones than just the apps they are buying. App Store sales stats are hardly the same thing as device activity stats, and we'd love to look at those. No doubt, people are using the iPad a lot for its web browser and email capabilities, and the iPhone to make calls and send text messages. But we think the App Store records are a good directional indication of what's happening.

Source: Business Insider (SAI)