Telecoms analyst Ovum says 18bn applications will be downloaded this year, of which only 8.1bn will be for the Apple OS.

While that is not bad, it means that despite having a huge application library, smartphone users are abandoning the iTunes store in droves, Ovum claims that Android smartphone users will download more apps than Apple iPhone owners this year, as sales of devices using the Google operating system surge ahead.

Applications will jump from a total 7.4bn downloaded in 2010 to 18bn this year. This means that for the first time phones running on Google's Android operating system will download more apps than iPhones, with 8.1bn going to Android phones compared with Apple's 6bn.

In the second quarter of the year, Android accounted for 46% of smartphones sold, while Apple was the second highest seller at 20%. Ovum says Android will reinforce its lead, and by 2016 there will have almost twice the number of downloads as the iPhone – 21.8bn compared with 11.6bn.

This is of cause assuming that Apple does not win its court case which is designed to stop all competition.