Apple achieved a remarkable end to the decade by achieving a record $1.42 billion in sales on its App store between Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve, a 16 percent increase over last year. It broke the single-day revenue record of its App store when customers spend $386 million on New Year’s Day 2020 alone, a 20 percent increase over last year.
The Cupertino giant dived into a new market by launching services such as Apple Arcade, Apple TV+, Apple News+ and Apple Card last year. It continued the development of already existing App Store, Apple Music, and iCloud services.
“2019 was the biggest year for Services in Apple’s history. We introduced several exciting new experiences for our customers, all while setting the standard for user privacy and security,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services.
Developers have earned over $155 billion on Apple’s app store since its launch in 2008 in 155 countries. However, a quarter of those earnings come from the past year alone. Apple said that the App Store is the world’s safest and most vibrant app marketplace, with over half a billion people visiting each week.
Apple gave extensive details about the other services provided by it without mentioning the revenue gains.
It highlighted the new time-synced lyrics feature of its Music app added in 2019 which have already been used by over 50 percent of listeners on iOS 13. Apple TV+ in its debut year expanded to over 100 countries and regions. It received multiple Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild nominations in its launch year.
The Apple TV app is available on Apple devices like iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Mac, iPod touch and select Samsung smart TVs, and Amazon Fire TV and Roku devices. It will be further available on LG, Sony, and VIZIO smart TVs later this year.
Apple arcade is a game subscription service available within the App Store that offers its users unlimited access to 100+ exclusive games playable across IOS devices. Apple News has more than 100 million monthly active users in the US, UK, Australia, and Canada. Apple has further collaborated with the news agency ‘ABC News’ for providing live coverage of key moments in the US presidential election.
Apple podcasts currently offer free access to over 8,00,000 shows in 155 countries. Even Spotify has just over 5,00,000. During 2019, Apple Pay was used to book tickets of more than 150 stadiums, ballparks, arenas and entertainment venues around the world on Apple Devices. Tickets for Public transport in cities like Shanghai, Beijing, Tokyo, Moscow, London and New York can also be bought with Apple Pay.
For improved security, Apple noted that over 75 percent of iCloud users have enabled two-factor authentication, an extra layer of security designed to ensure that only user accesses their account or data.
Eddy Cue further said, “We begin the new decade with incredible momentum and gratitude to our customers who have shown such enthusiasm for all of our Services, and we continue to celebrate the work of the world’s best creators, storytellers, journalists, and developers.”
