26% of Apps Downloaded in 2010 Were Used Just Once

App downloads are only one metric but getting someone to download an app just to have them uninstall it doesn’t do you a lot of good. Well analytics firm Localytics tracked Android, iPhone, iPad, Blackberry and Windows Phone 7 apps and found that the rate of one-time app usage was around 26%. That’s pretty high. It tells you that a lot of apps either sound or look appealing but fall short or that users just want to try something out and it doesn’t quite get them there.

The good news is that people are downloading lots of apps and trying out new apps regularly. I recall Ballmer stating that the average WP7 users downloaded an app a day on average.

In the end, downloads figures are only the start. These types of analytics help developers to tweak their apps to make htem appealable and keep the reuse rate high.