Combined revenue from the “four major mobile application stores” will increase by 77.7 percent to US$3.8 billion in 2011, with Apple’s App Store forecast to snag a “gargantuan” three quarters of this, according to a study from IHS Screen Digest. The figures compare with US$2.1 billion of revenue in 2010 and US$830.6 million in 2009. Looking forward, total download revenue from games and other applications is projected to continue rising in the next few years, jumping to US$5.6 billion in 2012, US$6.9 billion in 2013, and US$8.3 billion in 2014, with Apple still dominating at the end of the period – although its share will decrease to 60 percent from 76 percent.

The company notes that the market is currently dominated by Apple’s App Store, Google’s Android Market, Nokia’s Ovi Store and RIM’s BlackBerry App World. However, “other sites, such as Microsoft’s Windows Marketplace, conceivably could gain enough size and presence in the future to shake up the market.” While Apple is an established leader, it is Android Market which will see the fastest growth in 2011, with sales “soaring” by 295 percent to US$425.4 million, compared with Apple’s US$2.91 billion. RIM’s BlackBerry App World will fall from second to third place, with forecast revenue of US$279.1 million – although it will achieve this with 772.2 million downloads. In contrast, fourth-placed Ovi Store will generate US$201.5 million from 1.1 billion downloads.

According to IHS Screen Digest, the total number of downloaded apps in 2011 will reach 18.1 billion, compared with 9.5 billion in 2010, with the forecast of 33 billion in 2014.