Propelled by the tablet phenomenon, mobile app popularity is at an all time high. Within the last week of December 2011 alone, app downloads broke the one billion mark according to analytics firm Flurry. This was undoubtedly driven by all the tablets wrapped under people’s Christmas trees, with over 20 million iOS and Android devices alone activated during the “power week.”

At Quickoffice, we had a record-breaking week ourselves, achieving the top grossing paid app position worldwide, beating out the likes of Pages and Angry Birds! This brings up an interesting second point, how does the worldwide app download market stack up against the US? While the US definitely retains the lion’s share, with over half the total downloads, China and the UK logged 99 million and 81 million app downloads respectively followed by Canada, Germany and France. Yankee Group noted that the 2011 holiday season was the first time tablets, e-readers and smartphones were among the top four electronic gifts and predicts US consumers will download more than 12 billion mobile apps this year, 4.8 billion of which will be paid. That definitely paints a compelling and exciting market picture for 2012!

GigaOm nicely recapped the growing love affair consumers now have with mobile apps, as mobile devices outsold desktops and laptops for the first year. This was partly spurred by the fact that users are spending more time in apps than browsing and that the app obsession has officially become an international phenomenon. In addition to the above global power week statistics, GigaOm noted app downloads increased 870 percent in China, 527 percent in Argentina and 388 percent in Saudi Arabia in 2011. And, this love affair will only continue to grow with the explosion of voice-control integration and addition of niche app stores in the coming year.

IDC corroborates that tablets are poised for major adoption growth in Europe, with more than 48 percent of businesses planning to introduce tablets. This presents even more opportunities for app downloads. Given the growing worldwide scope of the app market, I predict it will soon start to consistently surpass the billion app download mark beyond one week a year. I see this especially affecting the app developers who create tablet-centric apps that support touch interface, various languages, form factors and address critical business utility. Quickoffice’s worldwide footprint brings us in direct contact with numerous users across different languages and we’re excited to see the opportunity for our apps, which solve key productivity needs.

Did you purchase a tablet or smartphone instead of desktop last year, or are you planning to in the near future?