Texas Hold’em is number 10 in Apple’s all-time top 20 paid downloads list, but in terms of income, we feel that it has jumped ahead of two 99 cent apps (Pocket Guitar and Flick Fishing) due mainly to Texas Hold’em's relatively high price of $4.99. Texas Hold’em has been a hit for Apple since its release on July 7, 2008 and it held the number six position in Apple’s list of most downloaded paid apps of 2008.

Texas Hold’em holds a unique place in the App Store: it’s a top-selling app that Apple developed. Apple only offers two more self-developed apps: the free Remote (which controls iTunes and AppleTV, using your iPhone as the remote control) and the 99 cent Keynote Remote (which controls Keynote, essentially Apple’s version of Power Point, using the iPhone as a remote control).     

When introducing Texas Hold’em, Apple made the decision to sell one of its own apps in the App Store, which (in theory, at least) exists for third-party vendors. We find this choice somewhat disturbing. Granted, Texas Hold’em adds impressive graphics and interactivity to a virtual poker game, but isn’t Apple making enough money with the iPhone without asking users to pay for this app?  This reminds us of Apple’s decision to include the free iMovie video editor on every new Mac, while charging users $29.99 for QuickTime Pro. iMovie specifically blocks importing anything other than digital video from a camcorder. Thus, Mac users require QuickTime Pro for the everyday activity of converting a standard camera video (or a downloaded or cell phone video) to another format. Regardless, Apple as an app developer doesn't have to split its revenue with the company's iTunes division, unlike every other paid app developer, so Apple makes lots of profit on this game.