Windows Store surpasses 20,000 apps

[Master Devwi]

The Windows Store passed the 20,000 app barrier over Thanksgiving, continuing its rapid expansion. When Windows 8 and Windows RT were released exactly a month ago, the app store was sitting at 7,000, so an increase of three-and-a-half times that number in less than 30 days is pretty impressive.

As of Thanksgiving Day, the Windows Store was sitting at 20,610 apps worldwide, 17,958 of which (87%) don’t cost a single cent. The Windows Phone Store, by comparison, is about ready to hit 120,000 apps, while Google Play (Android’s app store) has more than 600,000 apps and the Apple App Store has over 700,000. But, as Paul Thurrott wisely points out, the Mac App Store – which launched on January 6, 2011 – still has just 12,638 apps.

While a few apps like Amazon Instant Video are still absent, many big names are already available on the Windows Store. Enough, in fact, that I haven’t noticed any glaring gaps in everyday use. The release of Angry Birds Star Wars on all major platforms on day one (including Windows Phone and Windows 8) was also notable.

What’s your favorite app on Windows 8? Are there any that you’re particularly looking forward to?

[Win App Update on Twitter via SuperSite for Windows]

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[Big Sky]

iTunes has a gazillion.........all for the most part useless apps. It is nice to see a strong ramp up for Windows but how many are productive/useful apps and not just LAME games/Horoscope reader and ilk/iFart, other crap like iTunes. What I am getting at is Windows is more business oriented as a whole. Just wondering how all this fits in with the business user.

[kasrhp]

@Big Sky,

There are some actual useful apps, but the insane majority are garbage apps or nice looking apps that take away the need for a web browser. All the major news outlets have their own apps, Netflix, Weather, etc. and the Windows Store seems more focused on portable solutions than real software. Most apps won't let me share articles across social networks (like the Microsoft Finance app), which I use to market my business, or really do anything productive.

I spend 99% of my time in the old desktop running legacy software because that's the only place I can actually get things done. It's still early on the app front, and time will tell how things improve, but at this point I'm not enjoying the new Windows, and the lack of quality software for the new platform is a huge factor in that.