Is there a real "app gap"?

[Sir William Wiener]

Hands down by the numbers, the iOS and Android app portfolios are much much larger than WP8's. But are they really?

I've had both an iPhone and Android before my first WP (Lumia 928, now Icon) and if you search for say a flashlight or a calculator app on iOS or Android you literally see 100's of them (Hell even our modest WP store has like 20 flashlight apps now), out of those 100 Android Flashlight and calculator apps 60-70 are complete garbage and may pose a security risk to your device and the remaining minority are unimpressive and the same and slow to get updates and bug fixes. As for Apple most their free apps are crappy quality or are clearly watered down, if you want quality iOS apps be prepared to spend $0.99, $1.29 or $1.99 The whole quality Apple apps sentiment is completely disingenuous to those who haven't had as much experience with the fabled "Holier Than Thou" Apple App Experience and can critique almighty Apple objectively.

If we took away all instances of over saturation of particular apps and just counted the top 3 rated Apple and Android store selections for each app type and function the iOS and Android selection would still be larger and more refined (as to be expected from a Duopoly) than WP's selection but not nearly as much.
We probably have less than 10 popular high volume downloaded Apps (most being from Google) missing from WP8 right now and in terms of true app diversity WP isn't far behind anymore. I've literally read an iPhone using tech reviewer on Engadget complain about WP8 not having a wine tasting app that his iPhone has. I **** you not.. A F###ING wine taster's app. How will we ever live guys!!!! :unhappy:

I'll put a 4-5 star rated WP8 up against any of its equivalent 4-5 star rated iOS/Android counterparts.

 

[emperor_skull]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

That's true

 

[prasath1234]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

Then where is the flipboard.

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[Pranjal Rai]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

The only thing i would say lacking is the dev support, for the apps which are better on ther platforms. They need to show us some love man, believe it or not. Also the quality of a few apps is not on par with those on other platforms. It really disturbs me sometimes.

I have a friend who is an iSheep. He's really annoying, when he says that app gap is too much between our respective platforms. He is really one of those a**holes. I mean, we are moving forward atleast, aren't we? He never even thinks how WP is in some ways better that iOS. Another of my friend, who is currently a Moto G owner, was once a real fan of WP, but when he saw that apps were "less" on the store, that stupid son of a b**ch got a lagdroid for himself. People like these need to be taught a lesson. So my basic point is, if you love your phone, stop talking crap about others'.

 

[Martin hfd]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

I own a WP about a year now and have "converted" 3 of my friends, one from iphone and two from crapdroid, and when I was telling how to set up their phones , explaining how maybe not all their apps were going to be on WP - they were concerned... Two days later I asked one of them (the one that is coming from Iphone) how is he dealing with the app gap.... His response was What app gap? I have every app that i need... The other two were ******** about this game or that game but said that they would keeps using WP because of fluidity and integration with windows and office (one of them has set up his phone as a complete remote for his PC, XBOX, TV etc. which is awesome by the way).
So the problem here is purely the marketing that Microsoft doesn't have about WP, MS must step up their game in the marketing dpt. and start with aggressive marketing like: "You want [insert app here], WE GOT IT!" so that the users can see that the app gap is just an illusion (notice that I am not talking about local apps before someone starts " BUT I DON'T HAVE MY LOCAL BARBER SHOPS APP SO THAT HE CAN CUT MY HAIR WITH VIRTUAL REALITY INSTEAD OF WALKING 4 MIN TO GET THERE OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT").
Just my two cents....

 

[yaron zeevik]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

As a former android and iPhone user I have WP for a year now and I love every little thing in the OS but the app gap is not just about big names.. It's about the special apps to..like smartwatches apps..duolingo.. Last fm descent app.. And all kinds of unusual apps out rare ones

 

[Chris_Germany]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

The problem are the LOCAL apps. Local bus service, cinema, shopping, post office....i dont know, stuff like that. These little but still important apps make the difference.

 

[Poirots Progeny]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

Agree with the gist of this thread.

There may be an overall lower number of apps, but the quality is there over the quantity - not always the case but generally.

The issue is that windows phone market share is so low, generally devs will develop for other platforms first, as the return on investment is there - even for ad supported free apps. That is where the money is. And, of course, the api's and feature set may not be present, in wp to create those apps that work with toasters and all that. The specialised stuff.

Hopefully that will come as wp matures.

The reddit yesterday is, in my mind, a good indication that Ms is not blind to this issue. Hopefully the increase in interest, and growth of wp market share will mean all those interesting and specialised apps will come sooner.

As well the more basic social networking apps. There is s society here that wants to be social too!!!!

 

[EC Translating Services]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

The market on WP sucks and the choice of apps is mostly made of very low quality trash.
News Aggregators
Most news aggregators on WP are subpar. I own Collector, Weave, Flux and others.They lack in connectivity, sharing functions, grouping functions etc. Flux will keep showing read articles in the unread section. Developer told me it wasn't true; sent him a screenshot, then told me it was true and he'd fix. It's 3 months ago. I still have the issue. Weave, crashes all the time, especially when creating news threads lists in groups. Just crashes. Sent countless logs to developer. He told me Weave hadn't been tested with a Lumia 1520. Collector it's madness. It asks you to add RSS one by one and has no grouping functions or very limited. NONE ALLOWS TO IMPORT AN OPML file; none allows to group multiple RSS feeds at once.
Android has so much choice and so much quality in that area that it simply buries WP. Go test by yourself and you'll see

Calendars
Again, tried a variety and found one that for me is really good. However, before W 8.1 many didn't even allow you to delete events because of API issues. That said, most calendars have very limited choices in terms of customization and the closed nature of WP makes them look all alike more or less. I find them sad overall.

Book readers
Many choices, but all very primitive. Nothing that makes you think about really good good stuff.

Alternative keyboards
NONE and Microsoft has huge gaps in the standard input keyboard, including the one on 8.1 Dev Preview. It lacks several input methods for chinese and other languages.

Dictionaries and specialized language tools: NONE. I use Pleco and Hanping on Android. When i moved to WP i found myself lost. I bought a dictionary that got nice reviews by other WP users and found out it's trash. So it's either me spoilt by Android of those users settling for less. There isn't any real app covering the needs of translators or people operating globally and Bing translator is a joke also compared to Google translate for mobile. For example, translates chinese characters without showing the pinyin. That's gross, really gross.

Games: WP is good, really good.

Note taking apps: All crap, bad interfaces, shaky input, bad graphics.

MAPS: Leaving aside most map apps are using a sort of prebuilt template (different names but they all look alike, including the cat screen asking for an offer on two Map apps), they are hilarious implementations of Google maps with countless shortcomings like: A) Google Maps allow you to tap a Metro station and you get names in english and chinese and show that with a very good resolution; Maps on WP show blurred, unclear, some lack Metro stations that are recently built in some areas. They all miss a lot of restaurants, and other important POI locally in Taiwan and China for example, whereas Google shows just the right thing.

Tons of apps with different names but built with same templates.
Tons of apps with same names or extremely similar one (as if copyright and IP were mere opinions), like when you wander in a chinese market and can buy copies of the real stuff.

Searches in the market: Another disaster. You search for a calendar and get hundreds of things you don't need and, maybe, 2 calendars. Search for news aggregators and, this time, get lots of them, many missing and lots of useless stuff, unrelated.

I could go on for an evening talking of the issues about app gap but i think the above is enough.

Just to clarify, I hate Android, i migrated to WP because i hate the fact Android and Google eat your data and thrive with your life information not to mention the fragmentation, the slow updates the unpolished code used for Android that makes it slow after a while etc.
However, the WP market is really a cheap copy of the good ones.. And it's well known. To the point that many analysts point at the WP market as a key element stopping users from adopting WP as preferred platform as well as the main barrier to the platform expansion. I can cope with the OS that has limitations IF I AM GIVEN ALTERNATIVES. But if you close your OS, make it buggy and limited and then don't even offer me a good market i run. Like me many other users who would love to migrate from Android to other platforms. In my case alternatives of choice are WP and Blackberry (if it survives).

 

[Poirots Progeny]

E C translating services - you make some very valid points - clearly ms has a way to go.

As a writer I use the dictionary a lot - I can't believe the best choice is an Oxford advanced learners dictionary. But then there isn't anything else. The developer ( in this case oxford elt) hadn't made it.

And yes there are a whole load of other apps but how can one rely on a dictionary that isn't officially sanctioned and verified?

The keyboard, well that is simply a design choice - at least they've gone with something new. The prediction engine (under 8.1 is soooo much better than it was before. Thank all that is good).

For the rest, well yes, it is lacking. Hopefully the big players will come as wp improves. They're is clearly a way to go.

You mention Chinese a lot, so I'll hazard the guess that you translate between English and the former... Localisation of wp services can always be improved. I live in the UK and the prediction engine would not auto correct some words properly - and English is a core target lol

Localisation is always difficult, and it should be done efficiently and with efficacy, especially when they're trying to grow in said market; but one can also understand that their need to polish the expertise in their core market first, before branching out.

Not justifying it, just reiterating a business fact.

But I agree, they're things ms needs to sort out sooner rather than later.

Business need the core functionality there, as you've illustrated. They would be wise to address these issues.

 

[oditius]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

I had Windows Mobile, I thought that was better than anything. I could change rom's and be back up in a matter of minutes. Then I heard of this new OS that can do more. It was called Android, so I had to check it out. I bought my first android, and before you know it, I had it rooted and was changing roms to find the fastest and best one. That went on for about a year or so, maybe a few more android devices than the first, but basically they are all the same, you need to root and find the rom that works best for you. Well time passes, and I thought I would give WP7 a chance, I bought the HTC Titan II, actually I heard rumors of US Cellular leaving Chicagoland, so I wanted to try out AT&T's network first. WP7 was ok, but not for me, I went back to USCC before I lost my place in the rewards. Well on Nov 9th USCC officially announced they was leaving, and Nokia officially had the Lumia 920 on sale. Was an easy decision I switched to AT&T and got the 920. But alas, WP8 was not of my liking, not enough apps, to meet my every needs. So I sold the 920 and went back to Androids. I stayed with them till Jan of 2014, then being in a tight squeeze, I switched to a dumbphone for a few months. I really missed smartphones. But paying off 3 credit cards in that time, I found I could go back without a stretching my budget too much. Now was the time to decide what phone I wanted. Since I thought my HTC One was the best thing since sliced bread, but I really didn't want to go back, I wanted something better. So I looked at the 1520 in the store.. WOW was I impressed by the phone, so I did some research and found 99% of the apps I wanted was either here, or another one that did the same. So I bought the 1520. And now I would like to announce "I AM NEVER GOING BACK TO ANDROIDS AGAIN" I mean that WP8.1 or later would have to cease to exist for me to go back to Android. (iPhone was never a choice, I had a 4s for a work phone and thought it was too small, and plain looking. And the 5s looks like a 5" d**k next to your ear.) I love the feel of the 1520, the smoothness of the OS. And more apps I actually use, then I ever had on Android. (The majority of the time with Android was finding the right rom to get it to run smoothly, and not having time to search for apps)

 

[A895]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

I dare say I never smell my own farts but, I will say that app count and quality is a barrier to entry for any OS that isn`t Android or iOS. That`s why you will always hear stories about someone switching between the 2 but rarely do you hear someone come from high end devices from either Android or iOS come to BlackBerry or WP because without a doubt they have become that good. I think a lot of this buggy, laggy, malware stuff needs to stop, unless you OWNED a recent Android device with the latest OS I don`t think you should be generalizing that Android as a whole or it`s apps (especially if you have never actually used those apps) are bad.

For those who believe Android apps are terrible, please take a look here:

Android Niceties

 

[oditius]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

I came from a HTC one to the Nokia 1520 (with a dumbphone in the middle) Not going back to Androids. WP serves me well and does everything I want, what you want is of no matter to me. You want Android, then knock your socks off. Since my HTC One was unlocked and rooted, I had the latest roms before AT&T pushed it out. I am not saying Androids are bad, just a little laggy and you have to change roms to get it close to perfect. And the One isn't that old. (Of course they have the M8 out now, and the only thing that can make it better? Is putting WP8.1 on it)

 

[Bernard Ofori]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

One of my friends had an iPhone and we always argued over whose phone is better in terms functions and features. I have a 928 and I kid you not, he always lost the argument. Now he ditched his over priced iPhone and bought himself another over priced plastic junk S5 just because he feels like an s5 has more features than my 928. Am like dude most of the features in the s5 are useless because he is not even going to use it. Told him he needs a simple phone that has features you will use.the app gap is narrowed now and what app he had on his iPhone windows store had it.lol

 

[Ivin Laney]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

Hands down by the numbers, the iOS and Android app portfolios are much much larger than WP8's. But are they really?

Yes they really are. When talking about some major official apps, specialty apps, and the newest fad app/game, WP will probably be lacking for the considerable future. Even the market leader Android doesn't always get the apps that iOS gets. The numbers just aren't there and its all about the money. Sometimes its hard for me to go from using Facebook Paper (awesome!!!) on my iPhone, to Facebook on one of my android phones (meh), to using the MS made WP Facebook (kill it which fire!! lol jk). Personally, the WP Facebook app isn't bad. It's just terrible and frustrating up against Paper.

I'll put a 4-5 star rated WP8 up against any of its equivalent 4-5 star rated iOS/Android counterparts.

I'd like to know which WP8 apps are better than their iOS/Android counterparts. From my personal perspective and as a current owner of all the top 3, (5S, GPE One and Xperia Z Ultra, NL 925) app quality goes iOS>Android>WP or iOS+Android>WP in almost every situation. What apps do you consider better?

 

[MyNL822]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

The title made me think you were 5 until I saw the app gap mentioned.

 

[Kasey Pierce]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

My wife was looking for a flash card app for my daughter and was bragging about how many there are over the Windows App Store. She downloaded a few (most had no or fake reviews) and realized that :
A) most of them were re skinned, highly laid out with ads, versions of the same ones and
B) eeeeeeeverywhere.
there were just too many crappy ones that she gave up looking.
Disclaimer: my wife is the kind of person who thinks all apps should be free and didn't even look in the paid apps section, but you get my point.

It's the same joke i always sue with people who talk about the app gap. Just because they have more apps doesn't mean that 200k of them arnt fart sound boards.

 

[mayconvert]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

Hands down by the numbers, the iOS and Android app portfolios are much much larger than WP8's. But are they really?

I've had both an iPhone and Android before my first WP (Lumia 928, now Icon) and if you search for say a flashlight or a calculator app on iOS or Android you literally see 100's of them (Hell even our modest WP store has like 20 flashlight apps now), out of those 100 Android Flashlight and calculator apps 60-70 are complete garbage and may pose a security risk to your device and the remaining minority are unimpressive and the same and slow to get updates and bug fixes. As for Apple most their free apps are crappy quality or are clearly watered down, if you want quality iOS apps be prepared to spend $0.99, $1.29 or $1.99 The whole quality Apple apps sentiment is completely disingenuous to those who haven't had as much experience with the fabled "Holier Than Thou" Apple App Experience and can critique almighty Apple objectively.

If we took away all instances of over saturation of particular apps and just counted the top 3 rated Apple and Android store selections for each app type and function the iOS and Android selection would still be larger and more refined (as to be expected from a Duopoly) than WP's selection but not nearly as much.
We probably have less than 10 popular high volume downloaded Apps (most being from Google) missing from WP8 right now and in terms of true app diversity WP isn't far behind anymore. I've literally read an iPhone using tech reviewer on Engadget complain about WP8 not having a wine tasting app that his iPhone has. I **** you not.. A F###ING wine taster's app. How will we ever live guys!!!! :unhappy:

I'll put a 4-5 star rated WP8 up against any of its equivalent 4-5 star rated iOS/Android counterparts.

rubbish.
I have used all 3 platforms and WP 8/8.1 is missing a LOT of apps. Not just wine tasting apps.
And, as far as quality goes, you are wrong. The facebook app on WP is complete garbage compared to android and the android version is garbage compared to the iOS version.
The free apps on android might be watered down, but the apps on iOS are not.
Look at the Microsoft OneNote app. It got all kinds of updates recently that even WINDOWS phone users don't have.
Google released Chrome on iOS Before it released on android and the iOS version is Better and smoother on iOS than it is on its own platform.

I get what you are saying, You only need 1 fart app, not 750 of them. That part, I can agree on.
On my iPhone I usually have around 60 apps total including the 10-15 it comes with out of the box.

The reason I say it's missing a lot of apps is stuff like Facebook. Facebook app is made by microsoft, Not facebook, and it sucks SO bad compared to the iOS version.
Starbucks: absolutely amazingly polished and beautiful on iOS. Android version, garbage. WP ? quote directly from an email I sent starbucks asking for an app...
"we are not interested in developing for WP platform, thank you for contacting us" -starbucks
My Federal Bank: same response, not interested in WP.
I have 4 local news stations: emailed and asked for apps: Not interested in WP
Everything Google: missing. literally Everything. G+, google drive, maps, etc.
There are 3 games I like, both on iOS and android, Not one of them on WP. (not a big deal, I don't use my phone for games but once in a blue moon.

There are more, but I have to make Serious sacrifices to own a WP.
There are at least 10+ apps that i use daily and want to use daily that are 'not interested' in WP.
I Love WP OS, and 8.1 made the OS itself absolutely awesome, but apps are missing and are More expensive on WP than any platform I have seen.
The apps that are there are not on par with even android, and android apps are not on par with iOS apps. even free iOS apps.

Not being an jerk but people come here and rely on ACCURATE info when considering the platform and I am not going to Lie to them, just to convince them to buy into WP OS.
Half the people that put up with Windows phones are people the decided to hate a tech company like apple or android for some idiotic reason they made up in their head or heard a friend say,
so they must Hate that other company, even tho it Could be better for them.

I am a tech lover. I don't hate Any phone platform, nor have a dreamed up some dumbass reason to hate a particular company.
Samesung is my least favorite company and I have bought and used 3 different phones from the company and my next TV will most likely be Samsung.
I do hate Touch Wiz, but not samsung.
Even Blackberry OS is cool, but I am not going to buy BB because they are missing just as many, if not more.

You know what THE most wanted app is for WP? The one you used to use on another platform the may never be on WP.
It's ok to love a platform, but don't be a blind hater that hates for no good reason. I can bet money that Apple nor Google has ever done Anything TO you personally that gives you a VALID reason to not like them.

 

[Arka1412]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

I'll put a 4-5 star rated WP8 up against any of its equivalent 4-5 star rated iOS/Android counterparts.

Really? I guess either u r drunk or maybe you have gone nuts..Whatsapp,Facebook,Instagram,Messenger,Skype,truecaller etc major apps are totally **** compared to Android or ios version..Maximum apps on WP crashes almost all the time..Praising WP is good but ignoring it's flaws like a stubborn is not acceptable..

 

[prasath1234]

re: Is there a real "app gap"?

If android is buggy or laggy I wonder why people stick on with it.:-o:what:

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