App Store Approaching 50 Billion Downloads

Apple says its App Store will soon rack up its 50 billionth download. To celebrate, the company has announced a new giveaway.

According to All Things D’s Ina Fried, “Apple said on Thursday that it is approaching 50 billion downloads from its App Store. As has become customary for such events, Apple is prepping a giveaway for whoever downloads the milestone app — in this case, a $10,000 gift card to the App Store. The next 50 customers will get a $500 App Store gift card.”

Salvador Rodriguez with the Los Angeles Times noted, “The App Store has grown enormously since launching one year after the iPhone in 2008. Just this January it reached the 40 billionth download mark, and now, four months later, more than 9 billion more apps have been downloaded.”

CNET’s Josh Lowensohn added, “Along with the giveaway, Apple’s listed its top 25 all-time paid and free applications on both the iPhone and iPad. Rovio’s Angry Birds and Facebook top that list on the iPhone, while Apple’s Pages and Microsoft’s Skype hold that spot on the iPad.”

The Mac Observer’s Bryan Chaffin commented, “50 billion. Billion. With a B. That’s 7.2 apps per person on the planet, and that’s all the people on all the planet, which Google tells us is currently 6,973,738,433. It boggles the mind.”