Apple today announced that the iOS app economy has created nearly 300,000 new jobs in the United States since April 2019, citing research shared by Dr. Michael Mandel, chief economic strategist at the non-profit Progressive Policy Institute.
Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Apple said the App Store continues to provide economic opportunities, with apps supporting essential needs like remote learning, telehealth, and food ordering. According to Apple, the App Store ecosystem now supports more than 2.1 million U.S. jobs across all 50 states, an increase of 15 percent since last year.
Apple's press release provides some examples of companies of various sizes that have seen success on the App Store in the past year.
"We've had incredible growth in the last year, and we've massively expanded our team to meet demand," said Maxeme Tuchman, co-founder of kid-friendly video calling app Caribu. "It means so much to us to not only be able to help connect families and friends at this difficult time, but to be able to provide stable, well-paying jobs to our growing number of employees as well. The App Store has given us a platform on which we can do both."
Apple also noted that it employs over 90,000 employees across all 50 states, and supports 450,000 manufacturing and supply chain jobs. The company is on track to fulfill its commitment to contribute $350 billion in the U.S. over a five-year period.
Wednesday May 21, 2025 8:21 am PDT by Tim Hardwick
Google recently made waves by showcasing a set of lightweight smart glasses featuring deep Gemini integration and an optional in-lens display. The demo has reignited interest in Apple's own smart glasses project, which has been the subject of rumors for nearly a decade. Here's a recap of where things stand.
Current Development Status
Apple is actively working on new chips specifically...
Apple is planning to launch a set of smart glasses by the end of 2026, reports Bloomberg. The glasses will be comparable to the Meta Ray-Bans and the Android XR glasses that Google showed off earlier this week.
Apple's smart glasses are expected to include cameras, microphones, and AI capabilities, much like the Meta Ray-Bans. The glasses will be able to take photos, record video, provide...
Apple's recently announced CarPlay Ultra promises a deeply integrated in-car experience, but not all iPhone users will be able to take advantage of the new feature.
According to Apple's press release, CarPlay Ultra requires an iPhone 12 or later running iOS 18.5 or later. This means if you're using an iPhone 11, iPhone XR, or any older model, you'll need to upgrade your device to access...
Apple is expected to launch an all-new ultra-thin iPhone 17 Air later this year, and while there have been plenty of rumors about the camera's overall design and thinness, we haven't heard any details about the device's weight and battery capacity until now.
According to the leaker going by the account name "yeux1122" on the Korean-langauge Naver blog, the 6.6-inch iPhone 17 Air has a weight ...
Apple today announced a more detailed schedule for its annual developers conference WWDC, which runs from June 9 through June 13. The schedule confirms that Apple's keynote will begin on Monday, June 9 at 10 a.m. Pacific Time, with a live stream to be available on Apple.com, in the Apple TV app, and on YouTube.
During the keynote, Apple is expected to announce iOS 19, iPadOS 19, macOS 16,...
The Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), Apple's annual developer and software-oriented event, is less than three weeks away. We haven't heard a great deal about macOS 16 ahead of its announcement this year, so we could be in for some major surprises when June 9 rolls around. Here's what we know so far about the next major update to Apple's Mac operating system.
macOS 16 Name?
Every year ...
Wednesday May 21, 2025 10:27 am PDT by Juli Clover
OpenAI is acquiring io, the hardware-based AI startup co-created by Jony Ive, OpenAI announced today. Ive has been working with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on io for two years, and the duo expects to develop a family of AI devices.
In a video shared by OpenAI, Altman and Ive outlined their partnership and what they expect to create as a result of the merger. "I have a growing sense that everything ...
I feel like this is a bit misleading. How many of these devs had other developer jobs before focusing on iOS? How many were front or back end devs? I doubt this 300k of devs were devs that never had jobs before.
Whatever you think about the App Store, the charging and whatever else, it has created a lot of jobs and wealth for many developers. Apple is not the only winner.
According to Apple ... says it all, as if these 300k people were unemployed, flipping cents at the corner. lol I want to see a decent non-apple statistics, not these mumbo jumbo numbers...
Never trust any statistics that you didn't forge yourself
Notice that it just says "jobs", not "full-time employment" or "Apple hires". I have no doubt that the iOS market is creating jobs, but I'm also sure those numbers include just about everyone who has done some work loosely related to iOS apps.
Well done Apple. And now let's wait and see how many people here have to badmouth this good news because they have a disturbed relationship to good things...
‚Fragment and destroy‘ was a battle cry of the Bolshevik USSR, and has been injected into the American zeitgeist from the ‚highest‘ level these days.
By the way: Are there surveys on the age, experience and educational level of MacRumors readers available?
Well it would be good to know the methodology behind these statistics. Is this 300K new app developers making a living from the something they have on the App Store?
I don't think so. They say 2 million people work on the app economy, there is no way those are all iOS developers. Maybe they count all the people involved in making an app like designers, backend developers, frontend developers for the website version, tech support, HR people. If that's the case, 2 million people may be a good estimate. But it doesn't mean there will be 2 mil people unemployed. I'm an iOS developer, but that's one of my roles in the company, I work on stuff unrelated to apps for about 50% of the time. I'd still be employed even if there wasn't the app store.
