Windows Phone Store hits more than 300,000 apps
And Microsoft expects the number to get much larger with the arrival of “universal” Windows apps. — Microsoft's Windows Phone Store has reached a new milestone with more than 300,000 apps on its virtual shelves.
Context & Ripple Effects
Three years after the marketplace's first 10,000-app checkpoint in March 2011, Microsoft has tripled its pace: 30,000 apps by Mango submissions in August 2011, 50,000 by that December, then 100,000 by June 2012. Reaching 300,000 in August 2014 closes most of the raw-catalog gap with rivals, though the count alone has never been the platform's problem — headline-app availability is.
The milestone lands alongside Microsoft's bet on "universal" Windows apps, which follows the separate path the Windows 8 store took when it hit its own 100,000-app mark in July 2013. If one codebase serves both PC and phone catalogs, Microsoft expects the Windows Phone number to climb well past 300,000.
First-order effects
- Developers weighing Windows Phone get a stronger counterargument to the 'app gap' critique: a 300,000-strong catalog plus a promised write-once path into both Windows and Phone stores.
- Microsoft gains a marketing data point for carrier and OEM partners at a moment when Windows Phone's shelf presence depends on convincing handset makers the ecosystem gap is closing.
Second-order effects
- Google and Apple face no pressure on raw counts, so competition shifts to the small set of marquee apps where Windows Phone still lags — expect Microsoft to court those publishers individually rather than chase volume.
- If universal apps deliver, toolmakers and cross-platform framework vendors reprice their Windows support, since a single submission now reaches two storefronts instead of one.
Third-order effects
- App-count milestones lose their signaling power across the industry: once every major store exceeds six figures, developer decisions hinge on monetization per user and flagship titles, not catalog size.
- If the universal-app model holds, Microsoft effectively merges its phone and desktop ecosystems into one developer target — a structural answer to being third in mobile rather than an app-by-app catch-up game.
The trend: Mobile app platforms are moving from counting catalog size to competing on unified development targets and headline-app depth, with Microsoft's universal Windows apps as the clearest attempt to collapse two storefronts into one.