Nintendo's first experiments of bringing its characters to Apple devices - Pokémon Go and Super Mario Go, both ended up in the top 10 iOS apps downloaded worldwide in 2016, announced Apple on Thursday.
Pokémon Go, which Apple refers to as "cultural phenomenon" in their press release, was the most downloaded iOS app while Super Mario Go was the most downloaded app on Christmas and New Year's Day. The App Store offers 2.2 million apps in total, 20 percent more than the previous year.
With interest spreading like wildfire after its release, the success of Pokemon Go was one of the major highlighted stories of 2016 - and it even catches its creator unaware as demand rocketed past beyond its most ambitious expectations.
Apple also announced that the company was able to rake in $20 billion in 2016, which was up 40% from last year, and takes a roughly 30% cut of what developers sell. This implies that the App Store grossed somewhere around $28 billion last year.
For this year, the giant-tech started to take a smaller cut of App Store revenue if developers offer a subscription option. The new App Store search ads, according to Apple, are effective with a 50% conversion rate. Apple also emphasized that its subscription business grossed $2.7 billion.
Seen as a critical way to keep revenue and margin up in the face of declining iPhone sales, the company suggests that 2017 will be a bigger year for its App Store business. With $240 purchases made in App Store, January 1st was a record-setting day, according to Apple.
Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing Philip Schiller was understandably stoked on the numbers.
"We want to thank our entire developer community for the many innovative apps they have created - which together with our products - help to truly enrich people's lives," he said on the press release statements.
