Not all that long ago, a gigabyte was thought to be a massive amount of storage space that would be more than enough to house all of the media that you were intending to consume. However, these days a gigabyte is next to nothing, and even on smartphones you would find users that wouldn’t want any less than 64GB in order to ensure that their phone continues to run as smoothly as possible. The cause for this phenomenon, rather surprisingly, is innovation.
A recent study by ST, has shown that top iPhone apps are now almost 4 times larger than they were during the initial days of the iPhone, and there are a number of factors that contributed to this being the case. The apps that were counted in this study were Amazon, Google Maps, Gmail, Instagram, Netflix, Zoom, Facebook, Messenger, TikTok and YouTube, basically all of the apps that have been relevant over the course of the past five years. This trend has been seen across the board, which means that the increase in size has more to do with market requirements rather than any decisions that app developers might have been making themselves.
One contributor to this phenomenon is the fact that these apps are adding more and more features into the mix. Innovation is making everyone’s lives a lot easier, but it is also forcing these app developers to create increasingly larger apps. Other factors that might play some kind of a role in this phenomenon would be the increasing security features that app developers need to incorporate in order to make it so that their various users can enjoy at least some degree of safety while making use of their services.
Gmail is actually the biggest culprit in this regard, with the app growing a ridiculous 19 times its size in 2016. This much of an increase over just five years is really quite massive especially when you take into account the fact that it is basically just an email app, however, the additions that are being made are more or less being facilitate by increasing storage capacities in phones as well as cloud storage capabilities being vastly improved over the years.
One thing to note here is that the increase in size actually has a lot to do with app consolidation. Basically, the much heavier Gmail app of 2021 has bits and pieces of other apps such as Meet and Chat as well which makes it make sense that the app is now a lot larger than it used to be. It seems likely that this trend will continue in the future and apps will become ever heavier.
Read next: Loneliness After a Year Indoors: More than 1 in 5 people said Zoom made them feel more lonely during the pandemic (infographics)
A recent study by ST, has shown that top iPhone apps are now almost 4 times larger than they were during the initial days of the iPhone, and there are a number of factors that contributed to this being the case. The apps that were counted in this study were Amazon, Google Maps, Gmail, Instagram, Netflix, Zoom, Facebook, Messenger, TikTok and YouTube, basically all of the apps that have been relevant over the course of the past five years. This trend has been seen across the board, which means that the increase in size has more to do with market requirements rather than any decisions that app developers might have been making themselves.
One contributor to this phenomenon is the fact that these apps are adding more and more features into the mix. Innovation is making everyone’s lives a lot easier, but it is also forcing these app developers to create increasingly larger apps. Other factors that might play some kind of a role in this phenomenon would be the increasing security features that app developers need to incorporate in order to make it so that their various users can enjoy at least some degree of safety while making use of their services.
Gmail is actually the biggest culprit in this regard, with the app growing a ridiculous 19 times its size in 2016. This much of an increase over just five years is really quite massive especially when you take into account the fact that it is basically just an email app, however, the additions that are being made are more or less being facilitate by increasing storage capacities in phones as well as cloud storage capabilities being vastly improved over the years.
One thing to note here is that the increase in size actually has a lot to do with app consolidation. Basically, the much heavier Gmail app of 2021 has bits and pieces of other apps such as Meet and Chat as well which makes it make sense that the app is now a lot larger than it used to be. It seems likely that this trend will continue in the future and apps will become ever heavier.
Read next: Loneliness After a Year Indoors: More than 1 in 5 people said Zoom made them feel more lonely during the pandemic (infographics)
