Spring Sees Rise of Instant Apps in Iran

EghtesadOnline: Iran’s largest Android market Cafe Bazaar has released figures for the first quarter of the current fiscal which started on March 21, indicating a significant rise in the use of Instant Applications.

News ID: ۷۴۵۶۳۳

14 July 2018

Instant Apps attracted more than seven million new users in the third month of the first quarter, spanning from May 22 to June 21, a 180% jump compared to the first month of the year.

Instant Apps are programs users can open before being required to install.  If users like the app, they can download and purchase it if necessary.

Unlike commonplace apps that have to be downloaded in full, Instant Apps can be launched with just a tap on a URL. To support this, developers partition their apps into small, runnable parts, so they can start within seconds, according to Financial Tribune.

The significant rise can be attributed to Cafe Bazaar’s recent update (version 7.16.8) which also features a wide marketing campaign for Instant Applications.

The technology had only been available to select developers until its general release this May, announced at Google I/O 2017. Google I/O is an annual developer conference.

In March, Google extended the feature to Android games as well. Game developers can now woo users by letting them tap and try a game without downloading it first.

Popular Handsets

More than 80% of Cafe Bazaar users own Samsung or Huawei phones, with the majority of customers in possession of Samsung Galaxy J7.

According to the Android app store, the majority of Cafe Bazaar users (52%) have handsets produced by South Korean tech giant Samsung, followed by Huawei (34%), LG (6%), HTC (2%) and Lenovo (1%).

Since most Iranian Android phone users have the Bazaar app installed on their handsets, the data can be expanded to the market as a whole.

Moreover, data released by the Android market shows that the Samsung’s Galaxy J7 is the most popular phone among Bazaar users with 10%, followed by Galaxy J5 (10%), J1 (5%), A5 (3%), J2 (2%), A7 (2%), A3 (1%) and only then moves to the Chinese brand Huawei.

The most popular Huawei model is the P8 with a 1% share of the market, and the Huawei Honor 5X also 1%.

Messengers and Weathermen

During the first quarter, messenger app downloads hiked by 54.6%. The rise can be traced back to the ban on Telegram which prompted users to seek replacements for the popular program. At the time of the ban was announced, Telegram had over 40 million active users.

The majority of programs published in this season were weather apps. One possible explanation is the recent heat wave which has hit the country hard coinciding with widespread power outages that have made life and work a misery in major Iranian cities.

The first two months of spring saw unanticipated rain showers while the third month surprised the public with sweltering heat.

During the first season of the Iranian year, downloads of weather forecast applications saw a 38.5% growth.

Next in line are adventure and cooking apps, with 30.4% and 21.4% growth rates, respectively.

Furthermore, the statistics reveal that the majority of apps available for download provide educational content for users, accounting for 17% of the programs.

The next most prevalent category is applications providing religious content (8%), followed by books and references (8%), productivity apps (7%) and entertainment (6%).

During spring, program purchases mostly occurred at 11 a.m. Games, however, for the most part, were bought after midnight.

Installations

Cafe Bazaar has also published data on the number of active installations of different app categories, with messenger apps expectedly taking first place with 6.8 million installs.

Messenger app downloads have experienced a 55% growth in downloads compared to winter. As mentioned before, the hike stems from the public seeking substitution for banned programs.

Following messenger apps are programs under the category of tools and productivity with over five million downloads.

Cafe Bazaar releases statistics at the end of every month. Facing no significant competition on a par with the Android store, the data reveals noteworthy information on popular trends among Iranians.