Google Play is a big business for Google, with distribution of content covering a large portion of the globe, with that market continuing to grow month by month. Australia is one of only a few countries which has access to the full gamut of content offered by Google, so we get to access all the goodness. At this time of year, Google is looking back at the year and has produced an infographic, as well as a ‘Best of’ list for each category in Google Play to let you know what’s popular.
Apps & Games
Apps and Games are the bread and butter of Google Play, with Android the driving force for what was once the Android Market. With over 1.3 million (as of August this year) Apps and Games in the Google Play, it’s one of the largest app markets out there. Stats wise, the Fastest Growing category in Google Play apps was Health and Fitness, with My Fitness Pal leading the charge. The Games category saw Candy Crush Saga as THE most downloaded game of 2014 (Shame on you all!). Google’s Play Games platform saw quite a large amount of interaction with 3.5 BILLION(!!!) Achievements logged in games that support the platform.
Google Play – Best Apps of 2014 (Congrats to Chris Lacy for Link Bubble making the list).
Google Play – Best Games of 2014
Movies & TV
In A/V, it was bitter cold and BRAIIIIIINS!!! that led the charge, with Disney movie Frozen taking out Movie of the year and The Walking Dead the most popular TV show. The interest in comedic genius and exemplary actor Robin Williams showed, with the star being the most searched for actor in 2014.
Google Play – Best Movies of 2014
Google Play – Best TV Shows of 2014
Music
Disney had a win in Music as well, with the Frozen soundtrack taking out the Album of the Year. With some great soundtracks this year, it seems we took a shine to soundtracks from Guardians of the Galaxy, Despicable Me, The Great Gatsby and The Lego Movie (EVERYTHING IS AWESOME!!).
Google Play – Best Music of 2014
News
Google Play Newsstand was also a big winner here, with The New York Times (who have used Ausdroid as a source previously) taking out the New Source of the year. Remember you can check out Ausdroid on Google Play Newsstand as well.
There doesn’t appear to have been a Google Play ‘Best Newsstand of 2014’, but there’s a top ten in the Infographic below.
Books
Finally, last but not least Google Play Books showed that we’re all interested in Books based on movies, with all five of the Top 5 books of 2014 either a movie or about to be released as a movie. The Fault In our Stars – a book about a teenaged girl with Cancer took out the number one spot.
Google Play – Books of 2014
It’s a timely reminder to point anyone who hasn’t got it installed towards Google Opinion Rewards, an app that gives you Google Play credit in return for answering a few short surveys.
So, check out the infographic below, check out Google’s ‘Best of’ categories and let us know if you think there was an App, Game, Movie, TV Show, Album, Single, Book or News Source that should have been on the list.
Top news articles are mostly link bait list article.
In music, they’ve done the list of best Albums for 2014.
I wonder what the list of best individual songs for 2014 would be?