Apple's App Store hits 300 million downloads at 2.2 million/day

It was certainly the biggest Apple story of 2008.  The Apple App Store has surpassed all expectations to become the preeminent way to distribute applications to mobile devices.  Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Google Android and Symbian are following suit with plans for their own application stores.  Apple, however, has them beat by at least a year.

The App Store opened almost five months ago on July 11, 2008 with 500 apps available for download.

Today Apple released the information that it has distributed 300 million apps through the App Store.  A month and a half ago it had distributed 200 million, so it is sending out an average of over 2.2 million per day.  The numbers should only increase as more people get iPhones and iPod Touches and more Apps are released.

(macrumors)

Apple also just passed the 10,000 application mark in the App Store. At the earnings call 45 days ago, that number was at 4,500, so the number of apps has doubled in the past month and a half.

According to Silicon Valley Insider, Apple has only received between $50 million and $100 million from App Store programs, mostly because the free ones account for the lion's share of sales.  If the average price of an app is $3, Apple has sold anywhere from 14 to 33 million paid apps.  Still, not too shabby.

Apple expects to take in $1 billion from the App Store in 2009.  With the type of traction they are getting and a high probability of new products in 2009, they just might attain that.