An interesting report came out today from ZDNet revealing a particular fact about Windows Store app development. According to the report, the majority of the top 25 apps in the Windows Store right now are built in XAML, not WinJS.
For those who are new to Windows Store app development, there are four distinct flavors you can choose to develop your app. These are C++/XAML, C#/VB.NET/XAML, and JavaScript/HTML. Then you have WinJS, which offers the Windows Library for JavaScript controls, so apps can be created in pure JavasScript.
“If you’re new to XAML, that is Microsoft’s proprietary native app tooling. Based on Windows Presentation Framework from the Longhorn days, it’s also used by Silverlight and hence Windows Phone 7’s API. With Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, XAML was rewritten, although to developers it’s transparent whether you’re using the old .NET WPF/Silverlight or the new Windows 8 XAML,” ZDNet’s Matt Baxter-Reynolds explained in a blog post.
According to the report, the majority of the top apps right now in the Windows Store are built with XAML. In fact, 80% of the apps are built with XAML, while 12% utilize WinJS, and 8% utilize C++. For example, Facebook, Netflx, Hill Climb Racing, and Hangman Pro were all built using XAML. The only notable WinJS apps in the top-25 list are Microsoft Solitaire Collection, Viber, and Cut The Rope. Microsoft’s own apps, on the other hand, include the Bing suite of apps (News, Finance, Travel, etc), Camera, Mail, Calendar, Contacts, Reader, Skype, Store, and Xbox Live all utilize WinJS.
So it seems that the popular choice with Windows Store developers is the XAML language, while Microsoft themselves are sticking to WinJS. Not to toot our horn, but we coded our Windows 8.1 app using C#/XAML. For all you Windows Store app developers out there, which language do you code in and how do you feel about these results?
Further reading: Microsoft, Windows Store
