Cook: App Store, iTunes Radio sport prominent growth

Apple’s iOS App Store now holds more than 1 million apps. Tim Cook touted the milestone during Tuesday’s media event as part of a barrage of data Apple’s CEO unleashed to illustrate his company’s edge in the mobile market.

Certainly, the App Store number seems to confirm Apple’s continued advantage among app makers: That total is up from 700,000 apps, the amount announced at last October’s media event, and it puts iOS reportedly ahead of Android by more than 100,000 apps. What’s more, Cook said, App Store apps have now been downloaded 60 billion times since the store opened five years ago—the number of downloads has more than doubled since the 25 billionth app was downloaded just 18 months ago in March 2012.

Those downloads have been lucrative for third-party developers, as well: Apple has paid out $13 billion in fees to developers during the store’s lifetime, Cook said.

Cook also promoted one of Apple’s newest products, iTunes Radio, which is available on both iOS and OS X. Since the fall launch of iTunes Radio, 20 million users have listened to the service, Cook said; more than 1 billion songs have already been heard on iTunes Radio. Pandora, the music service most similar to Apple’s new offering, reportedly has a user base of 72 million active listeners.

Other numbers featured during Tuesday’s event:

• More than 9 million units of the latest iPhones—the 5c and 5s—were sold during the devices’ opening weekend last month. “It’s the biggest launch ever,” Cook said. That record was aided, of course, by a wider-than-usual opening weekend launch for the phone: For the first time, the iPhone was available for sale in China at the same time as its United States launch.
• Similarly, Apple’s new mobile operating system, iOS 7, was downloaded to more than 200 million iPhones and iPads during the first week after it launched last month, Cook said, “making it the biggest and fastest software upgrade ever.” Nearly two-thirds of all iOS devices in use—64 percent—are now running iOS 7.
• Earlier this month, Apple sold its 170 millionth iPad, Cook said. That’s up from 100 million a year ago. According to Cook, surveys show the iPad is used more than four times as much as its competitors combined, with Apple’s tablet continuing to top customer-satisfaction rankings. Nearly half of the App Store’s apps—475,000—are built specifically for the iPad.

Updated at 11:12 a.m. PT with iPad sales numbers. Updated at 3:24 p.m. PT with a video report.