Windows Phone touches 30,000 apps, opens Marketplace for Mango Apps developers

According to the latest update on Microsoft blog, there are nearly 30,000 apps available in the Marketplace for Windows Phone. As compared to its competitors like Android and iOS, it is still a far shot away. At the moment iOS is at 425,000 apps and Android at 250,000 apps. However what is noteworthy is the jump the Windows Phone Marketplace has made from 11,500 apps to 30k apps in short time.

One of the USP of  Marketplace is the fact that the apps will run on the Mango platform as well. The Mango is an upgraded OS for Windows Phone, which will bring a lot of new features with it, for instance, background audio, fast app switching, multiple and double-side Live Tiles, better search integration and several other features.

In addition Microsoft has opened up the Windows Phone Marketplace for the app developers to submit their Mango apps on it. It has even updated the Windows Phone Software Development Kit (SDK 7.1) to Release Candidate (RC) status.

The SDK is available in both English as well as in Japanese, said Microsoft. The SDK has an option to “Go Live” through which the developers will get the license to publish their Mango-ready apps to the Marketplace.

Along with this the SDK has a feature of “Marketplace Test Kit” through which the developer can test their apps for certification required prior to submission. It will help the developer to speed up the process because through it developer can test the performance of the application as well as identify bugs.