Wow, y’all really like to watch videos on YouTube. Google’s Android video player app, which was first publicly available way back on the 1.0 launch version of the very first Android phone, has now been downloaded from the Play Store over ten billion times. Quite a lot of that figure has to be from before it was even the Play Store.

Only one other app has hit this mark, and it’s barely an app in the conventional sense. Google Play Services is a backbone for the way Google interacts with Android and user accounts. Arguably, YouTube is the first user-facing app to reach this milestone.

Of course, just because there are ten billion downloads doesn’t mean there are ten billion users (more than there are people on the planet at the moment). App updates, new phone activations, and other multiplier events help pad that download number. But I think it’s safe to say that, with over three billion active Android devices as of earlier this year, YouTube is installed on the majority of Android devices sold outside of China.

Just for shits and giggles, Ryne Hager booted up his trusty, dusty HTC G1, the very first commercial Android device, to see if the 1.0 app was installed there. Yup, it was, though it isn’t actually functional.

Who’s taking bets on the next Android app to hit ten billion in the Play Store? Gmail is my guess.

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