By Todd Ogasawara on August 31, 2009 4:05 AM

AdMob July Mobile Metrics: Why do iPod Touch Owners Download Nearly Twice as Many Apps as iPhone Owners?

As I mentioned in the previous blog entry, AdMob’s report that the iPhone App Store is valued at $2.4 billion per year was called in question by sources queried by Cult of Mac’s Leander Kahney. These numbers will shake out after other analysts chime in with reports based on their own measurements. In the meantime, let’s take a look at a few other items in AdMob’s…

July 2009 Metrics Report

The first highlighted item in the report puzzles the heck out of me. It reports that iPod touch owners download an average of 18.4 apps per month compared to 10.2 per month for iPhone owners. iPhone owners buy slightly more apps than iPod touch owners (2.6 vs 2.0) but iPod touch owners download many more free apps (16.4 vs. 7.6). I find this statistic difficult to believe for one simple reason: iPod touch owners have fewer apps to choose from than iPhone users. Why? The iPod touch cannot make use of any app that works with the camera, GPS or the phone. Basically, there are fewer things you can do with an iPod touch than an iPhone. So, why do iPod touch owners download nearly twice as many apps as iPhone owners?

Number 5 in the top handset models worlwide based on percentage of ad requests is the Motorola RAZR V3? I’m not even sure what to say about that. No Nokia phone is in the top 5 (the N70 appears at #6).

The iPhone and iPod touch occupy positions 1 and 2 in the list with 15.9% and 11% of ad requests. Combined, their 26.9% of ad requests dwarf the number 3 handset, the Samsung R450, with its 3.2%. However, if you combine all the Nokia phones in the list, Nokia trails Apple in a distant 3rd place with 8.2% of ad requests.

I’m giving some thought of calling AdMob to see if someone there might be interested in discussing their metrics for a podcast. But, I’m not quite sure what to ask that would make sense given the number of behavioral unknowns in the data.