When it comes to mobile applications, you have to pay no matter what; you don’t have a choice. What I mean to say is that when you choose to buy the app, you’re paying from your wallet and when you choose to not pay for the app and have it for free you’re paying from your eyes in the form of watching ads that come with the free apps. According to the mobile analysis firm Flurry, people prefer to be patient with the advertisements rather than paying $0.99 for an app. They studied the data gathered over a time span of 4 years and tracked about 350,000 apps.
Both these methods were studied by the company and then the percentages of companies employing each method were compared. Results showed that in 2011, about 80% of the iOS apps were free and 15% of them charged $0.99. But since this trend wasn’t successful, now in 2013 about 90% of the apps are free and only 6% of them are charging $0.99.
It seems that the content producers have finally understood the needs of the people and are trying their best to cope with them. Therefore they’re giving the people what they want. As the study indicates, people want that they have free content. They don’t care if they have to watch the ads; they don’t worry about avoiding them. They don’t even care if the quality of the content they’re being provided isn’t very high. What they do care about is whether it’s for free or would they have to pay for it.
All these stats are good, but they can’t tell you about the differences among the different categories of mobile apps. This is because these stats are generalizations. As an example, consider the difference between financial or productivity apps and games. The former ones are usually more expensive and provide a more professional experience, one that is free from ads. While the latter ones are available on cheap prices and in most cases, free of cost.
Another interesting observation is the difference in the prices of applications on the basis of mobile manufacturer and model. Starting this April, the cost of an iPhone app on average has been $0.19. This is about 2.5 times less than the average cost of apps on iPad, which is about $0.50. Android apps turned out to be the cheapest, having an average of only $0.06. Flurry pointed out that this change in average app prices might have a relation with the income of the consumers too. For example Apple consumers are assumed to have higher incomes and hence have apps that have a higher average cost, especially when it comes to the iPad users.
Finally, having a low initial price does not necessarily mean that you’re paying less for the app. App developers usually give the app to consumers for free initially and once the users are hooked, they bring in subscription models to make sure they continuously receive the reward in the form of the users’ money.
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