Apple Announces 2023 App Store Award Winners

[MacRumors]

Apple today chose its 2023 App Store Award winners, highlighting the best apps and games on the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and more. Apple is recognizing 14 apps and games in total, with the winners picked by the global App Store Editorial team.

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According to Apple, the 2023 App Store Award Winners provided users "with meaningful experiences" and inspired cultural change. The picks "empowered users to unleash their creativity, discover a world of new adventures, and have fun with family and friends."

"It's inspiring to see the ways developers continue to build incredible apps and games that are redefining the world around us," said Tim Cook, Apple's CEO. "This year's winners represent the limitless potential of developers to bring their visions to life, creating apps and games with remarkable ingenuity, exceptional quality, and purpose-driven missions."

Apple selected App of the Year winners for each of its products, and Game of the Year winners for iPhone, iPad, and Mac.
Apps

• iPhone App of the Year: AllTrails, from AllTrails, Inc.
• iPad App of the Year: Prêt-à-Makeup, from Prêt-à-Template.
• Mac App of the Year: Photomator, from UAB Pixelmator Team.
• Apple TV App of the Year: MUBI, from MUBI, Inc.
• Apple Watch App of the Year: SmartGym, from Mateus Abras.

Games

• iPhone Game of the Year: Honkai: Star Rail, from COGNOSPHERE PTE. LTD.
• iPad Game of the Year: Lost in Play, from Snapbreak Games.
• Mac Game of the Year: Lies of P, from NEOWIZ.
• Apple Arcade Game of the Year: Hello Kitty Island Adventure, from Sunblink.

Apple selected five Cultural Impact Winners that were "recognized for their ability to drive positive change through apps and games."

• Pok Pok
• Proloquo
• Too Good to Go
• Unpacking
• Finding Hannah

According to Apple, the Trend of the Year was generative AI, with apps integrating AI throughout the year in multiple ways.

All App of the Year and Game of the Year winners will receive a physical App Store award modeled after the App Store logo.

Article Link: Apple Announces 2023 App Store Award Winners

 

[Jethr_o]

Also known as: the most profitable apps and games (from Apple's point of view) for the year?

 

[DesignTime]

Seems a little early. It's not even December yet.

 

[Steve-Jobz]

Tim: Thanks to these apps for paying the most Apple taxes.

Endless price increases, overpricing and subscriptions.

One-off buyouts have become a rarity. Bad money drives out good money.

Example: Agenda's buying model strikes a good balance between customer interests and developer profits.

Unfortunately, there is no limit to human desire. Even this modest business model is hard for other software developers to accept.

I've even seen basic iPad calculators for $5/mo. That's funny. Welcome to ApplePunk 2077.

 

[Silver78]

The app store is simply destroyed by in app purchase and subscriptions ..
just the 5 apps alone will set you back 367$ YEARLY!! in my country.. its total greed and a disgrace in my eyes.
I gave up looking in the app store years ago.
And even worse I can’t find a way to filter them away in the app store.

That exercise app look exactly same as a free and one time purchase one from many many years ago..

 

[svish]

Will check out a few on the list

 

[Steve-Jobz]

The app store is simply destroyed by in app purchase and subscriptions ..
just the 5 apps alone will set you back 367$ YEARLY!! in my country.. its total greed and a disgrace in my eyes.
I gave up looking in the app store years ago.
And even worse I can’t find a way to filter them away in the app store.

That exercise app look exactly same as a free and one time purchase one from many many years ago..

Agree.

 

[singularity0993]

The yearly $99 developer program fee is a huge barrier preventing many great open-source free apps from entering the App Store. That's part of the reason why App Store is currently filled with low-quality subscription apps. There is no competition from free alternatives.

 

[tigerintank]

The yearly $99 developer program fee is a huge barrier preventing many great open-source free apps from entering the App Store. That's part of the reason why App Store is currently filled with low-quality subscription apps. There is no competition from free alternatives.

Interesting - hadn't thought of it that way.

I'd thought of it as a filter that keeps out some of the dross.

Initially my reaction was $99 isn't that much, if you want to get your app out there - but ofc it depends on your economic circumstances as a s/w developer and where in the world you reside too.

 

[Piggie]

I know it will never happen as Apple want every single tiny bit of money it can get it's greedy little paws on, but it's such a shame they did not stick to some principles of wanting the very best experience for customers and put rules into place long ago to stop the app/game market going down this freemium/pay to play model.
As someone who has a long history of playing games in my youth it was so lovely that you bought a game and then you had the game.
The concept of having to pay more in the game had never been thought of.
I hunt app stores now and think a game sounds interesting, but after reading just a few reviews I'm turned off due to multiple complaints about adverts and/or need to keep buying extra items to make realistic progress.

It's horrible, and so sad the companies who run these services have allowed to whole entertainment? industry to go down this path.

 

[mrochester]

I know it will never happen as Apple want every single tiny bit of money it can get it's greedy little paws on, but it's such a shame they did not stick to some principles of wanting the very best experience for customers and put rules into place long ago to stop the app/game market going down this freemium/pay to play model.
As someone who has a long history of playing games in my youth it was so lovely that you bought a game and then you had the game.
The concept of having to pay more in the game had never been thought of.
I hunt app stores now and think a game sounds interesting, but after reading just a few reviews I'm turned off due to multiple complaints about adverts and/or need to keep buying extra items to make realistic progress.

It's horrible, and so sad the companies who run these services have allowed to whole entertainment? industry to go down this path.

Apple are already fighting regulators left, right and centre over how much control they have over developers. The very last thing Apple can do is dictate the business model of an app developer.

 

[SoldOnApple]

Shouldn't the App Store app itself win each and every year, seeing as it's the portal to all the candidate apps?

 

[SoldOnApple]

I know it will never happen as Apple want every single tiny bit of money it can get it's greedy little paws on, but it's such a shame they did not stick to some principles of wanting the very best experience for customers and put rules into place long ago to stop the app/game market going down this freemium/pay to play model.
As someone who has a long history of playing games in my youth it was so lovely that you bought a game and then you had the game.
The concept of having to pay more in the game had never been thought of.
I hunt app stores now and think a game sounds interesting, but after reading just a few reviews I'm turned off due to multiple complaints about adverts and/or need to keep buying extra items to make realistic progress.

It's horrible, and so sad the companies who run these services have allowed to whole entertainment? industry to go down this path.

Also games requiring online servers to operate means they can never be archived. You won't be able to visit any of the current games in your old age. We'll have iPhone emulators in 40 years time and someone will have archived all the apps themselves, but the companies will have long since shut down the servers and never released the code behind them. Console gaming today is the same way. There's no way to play Overwatch 1, it's just gone forever. If you want to relive the old game you need to make it from scratch.

 

[jrgibson1]

The yearly $99 developer program fee is a huge barrier preventing many great open-source free apps from entering the App Store. That's part of the reason why App Store is currently filled with low-quality subscription apps. There is no competition from free alternatives.

I don’t buy what you’re selling, unfortunately.

You’re suggesting that Apple should give away everything for free? All their R&D, their developer support, and what if every App released is $0, how does Apple profit then?

You already see so many **** free to download, free to play games that are just rubbish clones of each other and how do those devs make money: ads.

 

[Samplasion]

I don’t buy what you’re selling, unfortunately.

You’re suggesting that Apple should give away everything for free? All their R&D, their developer support, and what if every App released is $0, how does Apple profit then?

You already see so many **** free to download, free to play games that are just rubbish clones of each other and how do those devs make money: ads.

They could follow a similar process to the Play store, where in order to create a dev account you pay a flat rate of $25. Given how they ostensibly vet apps before publishing them, they would have no problems rejecting malicious and/or low-quality apps. But of course Apple wouldn't give up on that sweet $100/year/dev ca$h.

 

[mrochester]

They could follow a similar process to the Play store, where in order to create a dev account you pay a flat rate of $25. Given how they ostensibly vet apps before publishing them, they would have no problems rejecting malicious and/or low-quality apps. But of course Apple wouldn't give up on that sweet $100/year/dev ca$h.

I think the problem with your suggestion is you are asking Apple to do all the same work for a one off 25 as they currently charge 99pa for. The transaction needs to be financially attractive to Apple.

 

[robinp]

Too good to go is a great app.

 

[bousozoku]

The yearly $99 developer program fee is a huge barrier preventing many great open-source free apps from entering the App Store. That's part of the reason why App Store is currently filled with low-quality subscription apps. There is no competition from free alternatives.

If you're hurting that much, you're probably on a US$499.99 Windows machine. You can't afford the least Mac.

 

[bousozoku]

I find it amusing that Honkai: Star Rail is completely free, and you can play it that way, if you have patience, but it's made millions, just like Genshin Impact, and soon, Zenless Zone Zero.

 

[aleni]

You know it's a crappy award when Hello Kitty Adventure won goty.

 

[singularity0993]

Interesting - hadn't thought of it that way.

I'd thought of it as a filter that keeps out some of the dross.

Initially my reaction was $99 isn't that much, if you want to get your app out there - but ofc it depends on your economic circumstances as a s/w developer and where in the world you reside too.

It does indeed filter out some cheap copycats and spam. It also, unfortunately, filters out many non-profit projects.

It's not that open-source or non-profit project developers cannot afford this $99/year fee, but it is simply unreasonable to ask someone who has put a lot of effort into developing quality apps to pay to share their work, for free. Eventually, this cost has to be passed on to consumers, either in the form of Ads or purchases.

 

[return2sendai]

I don’t buy what you’re selling, unfortunately.

You’re suggesting that Apple should give away everything for free? All their R&D, their developer support, and what if every App released is $0, how does Apple profit then?

You already see so many **** free to download, free to play games that are just rubbish clones of each other and how do those devs make money: ads.

How much are the OSs ?

 

[breather]

Photomator is great!

 

[mrochester]

It does indeed filter out some cheap copycats and spam. It also, unfortunately, filters out many non-profit projects.

It's not that open-source or non-profit project developers cannot afford this $99/year fee, but it is simply unreasonable to ask someone who has put a lot of effort into developing quality apps to pay to share their work, for free. Eventually, this cost has to be passed on to consumers, either in the form of Ads or purchases.

I can certainly understand this, but the flip side is asking Apple to do something for nothing instead. Whilst many would argue ‘but Apple are a multi-trillion dollar company’, I don’t think it’s reasonably justifiable to ask Apple to do something for nothing just because they have a lot of money.

This is the problem when free and paid for services rub shoulders.

 

[Unami]

Seems like a weak year. Can't wait for sideloading to arrive next year - maybe that will bring some alternatives to that ever increasing pile of s...ubscription apps.

As for the $99 developer fee: It's not really a problem in the "west", I guess, even my elementary school kid could afford that, if he really wanted. But in really poor countries that could be a significant stumbling block (as could be the cost of an iphone or mac, but at least you could go hackintosh there) - maybe they should rather price it like the unreal engine. Make it free for developers below certain sales numbers. OTOH, it really could be a barrier for some scams. I don't buy the "apple should not do something for nothing" argument, though. They get 30% of every sale in the app store - and the more and better apps they have, the more attractive it makes their app store. That's far from nothing.