Apple's plan to turn Apple TV into a thriving platform for apps and games has seemingly not panned out yet – at least not in Europe. The company has revealed official App Store numbers.

In accordance with the European Union's new Digital Services Act (DST), Apple and 18 other large companies have been forced to reveal monthly active European users for each of its App Stores or platforms in Europe.

The EU's DST is meant to address illegal content, transparent advertising, and disinformation on online platforms with 45 million or more average monthly active users; so-called very large online platforms (VLOPs).

Here are Apple's numbers for Europe:
iOS App Store: 101 million
iPadOS App Store: 23 million
macOS App Store: 6 million
tvOS App Store: 1 million
watchOS App Store: under 1 million
Apple Books: under 1 million
Podcasts paid subscriptions: under 1 million

It is defined as "average monthly active recipients in the EU" that are "actually engaging with the service at least once in a given period of time", meaning that they have to actively open the App Store on, for example, Apple TV quite often to be counted, either to download new apps or games. Movies from iTunes /Apple TV are not included.

 Also read: Review: Apple TV 4K (2022)

There are obviously more Apple TV owners in Europe than 1 million, but they do not visit the App Store on a frequent basis which is bad news for developers of TV apps and games.


Google and the rest
As far as we are aware, Google has not disclosed how many monthly active users the Google Play store has on Android TV and Google TV, as Google counts the Google Play Store as one unit. Google has disclosed that there are 275 million monthly active users in the Google Play Store in Europe.

Smart TV platforms from LG, Samsung and others do not fall under the definition of very large online platforms (VLOPs).

- "Without prejudice to further consideration of the legal characterisation, Apple views each version of the App Store as a distinct online platform under the DSA, and only the iOS App Store may qualify as a VLOP. Nonetheless, Apple intends, on an entirely voluntary basis, to align each of the existing versions of the App Store (including those that do not currently meet the VLOP designation threshold) with the existing DSA requirements for VLOPs because the goals of the DSA align with Apple’s goals to protect consumers from illegal content," said Apple.

- Source: Apple