Following on from Distimo's assessment that 72 percent of all App Store revenue now stems from titles sporting in-app purchases (IAP), The Guardian's own sweep of stats taken from Apple's marketplace has delivered a similar conclusion.

According to Stuart Dredge – formally of PocketGamer.biz - of the 100 top-grossing iPhone games in the UK at the moment, 50 percent of them are freemium releases.

While that means 'traditional' paid releases make up the remaining 50 percent, more than half of those also sport IAPs.

All in all, that means seven out of ten of the top-grossing apps on British shores have IAPs employed in some form or other.

The paying game

Even in terms of paid releases, it appears the lower the price the better.

"30 of the 50 paid games cost £0.69, although 14 of those use IAP as a top-up," summarises Dredge in the report.

"Six titles cost £1.49-£1.99, 11 cost £2.99, one costs £3.99 and just one has an initial download price of more than £4: Sega's £6.99 Football Manager Handheld."

An aside to Distimo's recent report was the revelation that just 4 percent of the marketplace's library accounted for 72 percent of its revenue, painting a picture of an ecosystem that's a tough nut to crack for most developers.

Conversely, The Guardian's numbers indicates the App Store's wealth is actually well spread.

In all, 58 different companies have games in the top 100, with TeamLava coming out on top with five games in the line-up.

[source: The Guardian]