The market for apps around the world is 'still at an early stage'

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Business Insider

Apple CEO Tim Cook.

The market for apps may have matured, and the speed at which downloads have grown may have slowed, but "we're still at an early stage in the overall app market," according to App Annie research Danielle Levitas.

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Levitas told Business Insider that we've gone past the early stage of the app market, and there's more growth to come.

"Usage is continuing to grow at a very strong pace at a global basis especially in emerging markets, but even in mature markets where you may hear [things] like 'downloads are flat.' Well, they are kind of flat in Japan, they're growing but like single digits. The US even grew by 12 billion downloads last year. That's not flat.

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"We saw usage growth in 2015 in 2014 grow by 63% across Android devices, and it's similar on iOS it's just the number of countries that we have isn't the same and as large."

Time spent in apps chart

App Annie

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App Annie recently released a report looking into the app market in 2015 and how it grew, and one key takeaway was that there's still an incredibly high demand for apps - particularly amongst Android users in developing countries.

App market maturity

App Annie

Levitas says that emerging markets offer a big opportunity for app developers and businesses because of the large number of people owning smartphones and using the internet for the first time.

"When we look at a market like India ... from a smartphone standpoint it's still in its earliest stages. It certainly hasn't saturated the first quintile of the population, we're probably barely at the first 10% of the population. So from that standpoint, the apps that are catering to the higher end of the market will look a lot like a lot of other markets."

However, Levitas says there are still opportunities for local businesses to get involved: "Look at retail, for example, and it's about local brands. It's these local-first guys there."

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