Mac App Store Passes 100m Downloads

Apple's Mac App Store has hurtled past the 100m downloads point, less than a year after throwing open its doors to OS X users. Launching on January 6 2011 as Apple's method-of-choice for getting new software onto MacBook, iMac and Mac Pro machines, the Mac App Store follows in the wake of the App Store for iOS, which is already seeing 1bn downloads per month.

In that respect, the Mac App Store has a little way to go to catch up to its fast-paced mobile sibling. Still, "in just three years the App Store changed how people get mobile apps, and now the Mac App Store is changing the traditional PC software industry," Apple worldwide marketing chief Philip Schiller insists. "With more than 100 million downloads in less than a year, the Mac App Store is the largest and fastest growing PC software store in the world."

Apple has pulled out some of the Mac App Store success stories to comment on the download potential for developers. AutoDesk, Pixelmator and djay have all been rolled out to say how well their apps have been doing, though none have actually given download stats nor compared them to previous rates of adoption.

You can access the Mac App Store on OS X Snow Leopard and OS X Lion, and you'll need an iTunes account in order to download and/or purchase software.