The Apple App Store, which celebrates its fifth anniversary today, contains over half a million applications that receive very few downloads, according to new research.
The BBC reports that app tracking company Adeven has calculated 579,001 apps out of the total 888,856 iOS apps in its database are ‘zombies’. These apparently-lifeless apps never appear in any of the app charts published by Apple.
Paul Muller, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer at Adeven, is quoted as saying “We call the apps that hold no position anywhere in the world zombies because they do not generate a significant amount of downloads to sustain their further development. They may still receive a couple of downloads every day - maybe even up to 100 or so - but that is not going to be enough for a developer to capitalise on or draw motivation from to support the app.”
Earlier this year Apple announced that over 50 billion apps had been downloaded from its App Store since it opened on 10th June 2008.
[Sources: BBC News;