The App Store is growing again, and AI is probably the reason

Everyone said AI will kill software. In fact, new software launches are on the rise.

According to a new analysis from a market intelligence provider App iconsthe release of international applications in the first quarter of 2026 increased by 60% year-over-year on the Apple App Store and Google Play. That number was an even higher 80% when looking at the iOS App Store alone. In April 2026 to date, the total number of apps released has increased by 104% in both stores compared to the same period last year, and by 89% on iOS.

As Apple’s Vice President of Worldwide Marketing, Greg “Joz” Joswiak, spoke recent interview: Rumors of the App Store’s death in the age of AI “may be greatly exaggerated.”

The findings come amid concerns that the rise of AI chatbots and assistants will eventually see users abandon apps – a theory that is already being scrutinized by industry insiders, if No CEO Carl Peiwho focuses on developing a smart phone for the AI ​​era. The New York Times He also mentioned last year the possibility of new computing platforms to cover the smartphone, such as smart glasses, peripheral computing devices, or watches designed with AI features.

OpenAI is similar work on the AI ​​hardware device and Apple’s famous designer Jony Ive.

But there is another possibility: AI will make it easier for everyone to create apps, driving the rebirth of the App Store. A new app gold rush can be led by developers who have ideas but not the technical skills to develop mobile apps.

Appfigures data shows that some categories of apps are seeing more innovation than others.

Mobile games still have many new apps released worldwide starting from Q1 2026, as they have in previous years. But “creative” programs have entered the top five this year. The “utilities” category has also moved to number two, and the “lifestyle” category has moved from number 5 last year to now No.

The idea at work here is that AI-powered tools, like Claude Code or Replit, could be the catalyst for new startups. We also seem to be reaching a peak in the use of AI, where it’s easy for people to use these tools to quickly create their favorite apps – or even create their first apps.

The explosion of new software for Apple to review may also be behind the tech giant’s recent missteps. This week, Apple released the rewards program Freecash to the App Store in violation, after allowing the program to climb the top charts of the store and stay in the top five for months. Apple was also caught off guard by a malicious cryptocurrency app, the Ledger Live app, which dropped $9.5 million in crypto from victim accounts.

While high-profile problems like these can lead to bad PR for the App Store, the company still does a lot of heavy lifting to block and reject dangerous or spammy apps. Apple’s the most recent analysis from 2024 said the company removed or rejected more than 17,000 hacking and modifying apps that year; rejected more than 320,000 submissions that were found to be spam, plagiarism, or misleading; and took steps to block more than 37,000 potentially fraudulent apps from reaching users on the App Store.

However, Apple experts like John Gruber have argued for a long time to the App Store needs a “bunco squad” of sorts that oversees fraud or fraudulent programs that are growing in number or are very rich.

If AI-assisted vibe coding is going to be the driving force behind the latest software releases, the demand will only grow as new software floods the market, and not all of that can be good.