The Biggest Category in the Mac App Store is...

Last week's "revelation" that developers are shipping fewer Mac apps made the rounds and generated a few other questions. Many were curious to see what kind of apps are available on the Mac App Store at all.

Let's have a look at the top categories by total number of apps:

Games. Lots of games.

Surprised? I was. If you had asked me which category has the most apps before I compiled this list, I'd have surely said business. Why else would you visit the store? I don't know a single person who downloaded a game from the Mac App Store. But at 5.2K titles, games are the largest category.

Utilities, with 4.9K apps, and Productivity and its 3.7K apps do make sense. People visit the store for things that do things. For that reason, I also understand why the Education category would be busy, and at 2.6K apps, it's somewhat relevant.

The rest, which includes Music and Entertainment, I don't really get. But this is a top list by volume (aka. number of apps) and not revenue. If we were to look at that, I suspect the list would be entirely different.

Bringing this back to my point from last week:

Money for nothing. Lots of developers complain about Apple's 15%/30% fee for the App Store being too high, and while I think there's always room for improvement, the reach the App Store has is massive, and without it, most apps and games that came from nothing would have no chance. That's the App Store for iPhones and iPads, though. The Mac App Store is not the same. At all.

Most Apple users don't download desktop apps from the store. It has many positives (security, simplicity, discovery), sure. But people still don't do it.

My point last week was that without the Mac App Store turning into a download destination, iOS apps on Mac are DOA. With Apple charging developers as much for inclusion in a tiny and irrelevant store as they do for the main attraction (iOS App Store), and because developers can publish apps outside of the Mac App Store, there's really no way to justify being in it.

Which means... The only way iOS apps can take off on Mac is if Apple drastically reduces the fee. I find that unlikely. In a way, maybe that's another reason for Apple to move towards replacing laptops with iPads, where there's no choice...