David Farnor | On 22, Dec 2014

BBC iPlayer is the BBC’s most popular app, having been downloaded by UK users a total of 30 million times.

Last Christmas, there were almost a million downloads of the BBC iPlayer app over the festive period alone (Saturday 21 December to New Year’s Day) – highlighting the demand to watch and catch-up on BBC TV shows on newly unwrapped mobiles and tablets.

Indeed, recent Ofcom research shows that 44 percent of households also now have access to a tablet (up by a factor of four over the past two years), while one in three children in the UK now has their own tablet – almost double the amount a year ago.

The BBC has recently launched a new GO CBBC app designed to cater to the growing audience of young tablet and smartphone users. While the broadcast’s kid-friendly apps have proven popular, though, accounting for four of its top 10 (CBeebies Playtime has been downloaded 3.4 million times), the Beeb’s chart of most popular applications is dwarfed by the popularity of its flagship VOD service.

The BBC’s top 10 apps have been downloaded over 70m times since the first one was released in 2010, with iPlayer clocking up 30 million on its own – twice the number of downloads of second place BBC News (15 million) and more than three times the number of downloads for BBC Weather (9.5 million).

BBC iPlayer Radio is less popular, totalling 6.8 million downloads, as the rise of digital technology encourages the viewing of video on the go and on-demand.

This year, with tablet sales continuing to climb, the BBC expects Christmas to be a bumper time for its apps.

Ralph Rivera, Director BBC Future Media says: “With over 70 million downloads of our apps in the UK over the last four years, we know we’re getting it right. Whether it’s catching EastEnders on-the-go, the News in the sales queue, the weather before you trek to the in-laws or the kids favourite in the back of the car, our apps have everything you need for the festive period.”

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