Very low downloads in the Top Charts?

Welcome to the App Store outside the US.

Some categories are soft. You can get a high ranking without getting many downloads. Also sometimes it seems that the ranking system may be bugged, either that or that Apple manually gives apps higher rankings than other apps... even outside the advertised curated section.

Also note that 52 downloads is more than most paid apps get in 4 days. Enjoy the ranking and the little spotlight it gives you. Maybe it'll help your app will slowly pick up steam. I remember one guy made the top 10 on the Mac App Store and spilled the beans on Apple to the press that he only made $300. Probably got a little ranking booster because they liked his app or hit the top 10 on a soft day. I've made more money than that (not regularly sadly) in a single day and didn't make the top 10. Everyone expects if you chart you'll be a millionaire. But 300 bucks a day (no idea what price you are at) is around 110k a year. Wouldn't sound like a bad deal to me. Too bad 1% publishers get all the revenue. There's no way only 1% of publishers make good apps. Would be great for the economy if they gave Indy devs some shine sometimes. They review these apps. They know what's good.

Thanks for the info. I wonder what persentage of devs earn enough money from the App Store to sustian it as their full time job? (60K+)

Here's my current very rough and approximate power law estimate for gross revenue versus paid app developer entity (including corporations) ranking:

a = b * exp(-1.36 * r) - 100

where r is rank and b is related to the total App store gross.

This estimate suggests that somewhere between the top 2% to 3% might earn "enough" (for a solo dev). Also this estimate says there might be room for another couple dozen percent or so to have a gross revenue of more than beer/coffee money. But a third or so won't even cover their enrollment fee.

This power law estimate may or may not have any relation to reality, but a power law is usually a better fit than other distributions for this kind of network. With power law distributions, all the big money goes to the top fraction of one percent, but there is a very long tail of non-zero small revenue.

I would say less that 1% (maybe significantly less) make a full-time living writing apps. By that I mean indy developers working alone or in small groups. Definitely don't count on quitting your day job.

>I would say less that 1% (maybe significantly less) make a full-time living writing apps.

Mathematically, this almost has to be the truth. Cult of Mac reports:

After analyzing U.S. App Store revenue and download estimates from January 1 through March 31, 2016, SensorTower found that around $1.34 billion of the estimated $1.43 billion in net revenue generated went to just 623 publishers.

That means the other 61,677 publishers had to share the remaining 6 percent of the revenue, which was approximately approximately $85.8 million. If it was divided equally, they’d have made less than $1,400 each.

Article here: h t t p : / / cultofmac.com/427759/94-of-app-store-revenue-goes-to-just-1-of-publishers/

It is fairly safe to assume that there is no middle class on the App Store. You are either first or you are last. I think this is a shame. The App Store would be better too, if more hard working indy devs were able to eat. Apps by indy devs would be even better, and some are already pretty good and they are made by people who are starving. Apple would probably sell a lot more hardware to those devs too, you'd have to think. If you gave them an opportunity to make a bit of money, they are going to buy the latest hardware to make even more great apps... and the platform may get a whole lot better. But I guess it is easier for them to not take any risks.

Someone wrote:

> It is fairly safe to assume that there is no middle class on the App Store.

A power law distribution does have a middle class, it's just a very small one, slightly larger than the "winner" class, and not necessarily the same set of developers will occupy this middle portion of the curve from one quarter to the next.

e.g. the remainder is not divided anywhere near equally. The ones at the bottom get nothing/nada/zero, which instead goes to the few in the middle class.

My guess is that the number of developers making a middle class living is probably no more than 300. My gut tells me it's less than that (total guess, of course). I bet it's 150 people world wide.

If you look at the charts, it's generally filled with the same titles/publishers and few titles that jump in and out of the rankings. I look at the Mac charts more often, and you can really see some jumps on those charts. Outside the Top 300, there just isn't much money to be had. And we know the devs at the tippity top are 1 percenters. The devs jumping in and out of the 'middle portion' of the rankings I bet is a smaller group than the 1% making 94%.

If you have apps that go in and out of the rankings (like the creator of this thread) you notice that you can get a good ranking in certain categories without making a ton of money. I do believe there is a good amount of devs making nothing, and the remaining $85.8 million is certainly not divided evenly, but I'd be willing to bet that the middle class is a smaller group than the millionaire and billionaire class. At least by half. Maybe more.

I've busted in the top 10 on the MAS once or twice in a category, and didn't really make anymore money than a normal day. I've even filed bug reports when I noticed strange results in the rankings, never heard back though. I have one of best apps in that given category on the MAS. It charts from time to time, but it never sustains its ranking for long periods of time. The ten or so apps Apple picked to highlight in the front of the App Store for this category... some haven't been updated in centuries but they are always in the front...some of them are made by developers who have even abandoned the MAS and don't even have the current version of their app on the MAS. There are plenty of other apps that are better or just as good as the ones they show (made by lots of other devs).

My point is, I firmly believe if there is a middle class, it's very very small and you have to get lucky just to have a chance to make a normal living. Something about that just doesn't sound right. I think most people are fine with having to get lucky to be rich. But having to get lucky just to make 40k a year is why DT may become Prez.