Apple App Store to Get Overhaul?

The Apple App Store is an unparalleled success with 1.5 billion downloads in the last year. There are 100,000 developers currently participating in Apple's iPhone developer program. Only one problem: sifting through over 65,000 applications to find something useful.

Unfortunately, the current layout of the app store means that most users will never see even a fraction of the 65,000 that are available free and for purchase. Sure there's a lot of junk, however there are also many great apps that get lost in the crowd.

Tim Cook, Apple's Chief Operating Officer, acknowledges the problem, "As you know, today we do it by type of app and also have show popular apps and top-selling apps, et cetera. We realize there’s opportunity there for further improvement and are working on that.”

Could this mean that better navigation is coming to the App Store? We hope so.

Right now the easiest way to find decent apps is through the "Top" lists, which include the most popular paid and free applications.

Other apps featured on the front page of the App Store in iTunes are under categories such as Staff Favorites, New and Noteworthy and What's Hot.

The search function on the iPhone is only useful if the title of the app or the developer name includes the search term, and browsing the categories is tedious.

Easy to say the App Store needs improvement... not as easy suggesting a fix. We'll take Apple's word for it that they are working on further improvements.

Comments

Apple made AppStore too centralized in the age of "social networks". It should at least have a tag cloud. BTW, Cydia/Icy has a lot more potential in the "web2.0" field. Check out iWatcher.net which indexes 10 thousand of apps/ringtones/themes for jailbroken devices.