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# It Costs Apple $1.3 Billion A Year To Run iTunes & Other Great iTunes Stats
- URL: https://www.hypebot.com/it-costs-apple-13-billion-a-year-to-run-itunes-other-great-itunes-stats/
- Published: 2011-06-14T13:04:47.000Z
- Updated: 2011-06-14T13:04:47.000Z
- Description: An analysis based on data released recently by Apple pegs the cost of running on the iTunes store at $1.3 billion per year. "Since we know something about the average. Continue reading [https://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2011/06/it-costs-apple-13-billion-a-year-to-run-itunes-other-great-itunes-stats.ht
- Author: Bruce Houghton
- Tags: Uncategorized, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-01-21 10:55

[![image from www.google.com](http://hypebot.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451b36c69e201538f2fd665970b-200wi "image from www.google.com")](http://hypebot.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451b36c69e201538f2fd665970b-popup?ref=hypebot.com) An analysis based on data released recently by **Apple** pegs the cost of running on the **iTunes** store at **$1.3 billion** per year. "Since we know something about the average price of songs and apps, and we know the split between developers and Apple (and roughly between music labels and Apple)," according to the new [Asympco](http://www.asymco.com/2011/06/13/itunes-now-costs-1-3-billionyr-to-run/?ref=hypebot.com) report, "we can get a rough estimate of the amount Apple retains to run its store." **The data Apple published included:** 
  
  
 15 Billion iTunes song downloads  
 130 million book downloads  
 14 billion app downloads  
 $2.5 billion paid to developers  
 225 million accounts  
 425k apps  
 90k iPad apps  
 100k game and entertainment titles  
 50 million game center accounts

This chart shows iTunes “content margin” by month – what Apple “keeps” after paying content owners but before paying for other costs like payment processing and fulfillment.

[![image from www.asymco.com](http://hypebot.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451b36c69e201538f2fd198970b-450wi "image from www.asymco.com")](http://hypebot.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451b36c69e201538f2fd198970b-popup?ref=hypebot.com)