The last two years has seen a terrific rise in the number of app stores in the market. Today, almost all the mobile platform developers own their own mobile app store. While not all of these platforms may be as successful as the iPhone App Store or the Android market place, there is no denying the fact that application marketplace have become an inevitable discussion point when you are purchasing a new mobile phone.

However, not all apps bring money to the platform and third party developers. A significant number of apps are offered free simply as a Lite version (and thereby luring users to go paid at a later stage) or because these applications bank of volumes and make money off ads.

So what is the proportion of free vs. paid apps on the various application stores? Distimo provides us the answers.

Here is the percentage of free apps on each of these application stores

Apple App Store (iPad) : 23%
Apple App Store (iPhone) : 28%
Apple App Store (Universal) : 28%
Blackberry App World : 26%
Google Android Market : 57%
Nokia Ovi Store : 26%
Palm App Catalog : 34%
Windows Marketplace : 22%

Android marketplace has a resoundingly high number of free apps since paid apps are not available in a majority of international markets.

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