Does Google+ have more iOS users than Android users? It's barely been 24 hours since Google launched a rather buggy, but long-awaited iPhone app for Google+, but the app has already topped the App Store's list of "Top Free Apps."
According to the latest third-party estimates, Google+'s population has more than tripled from five million last week to around 18 million on Tuesday.
This feat does not reflect Android app download figures. Google+'s Android app launched the same day as Google+ and, according to Android Market estimates, it has been downloaded between 1-5 million times. Ironically Facebook for Android is the second most-downloaded free app in the Android Market after Google Maps, while Google+ doesn't appear on the list.
In a review of Google+'s iOS app, PCMag said the app was a "fine start" but was inhibited by its lack of support for iOS 5 or administrative controls in Huddle (Google+'s group chat feature). Click on the slideshow below to see how the iPhone app for Google+ works.
If Facebook's history is anything to go by, mobile apps are imperative to the survival of social networks. In January, Facebook topped the list of most downloaded free iOS apps of all time. Facebook boasts "more than 200 million active users" accessing the network through smartphones, and HTC is betting on Facebook Mobile junkies with a recently announced "Facebook phone," the HTC Status.
Now perhaps the greatest edge one social network can have over the other is an iPad app.