iOS downloads soar 23% higher in October for popular apps even as advertising costs rise

Sales of the iPhone 6S drove a spike in popular free iOS daily downloads in October, with consumers installing a total of 7.9 million popular apps, according to that month’s Fiksu Indexes, released this morning.

Downloads of the top 200 most-popular free apps in the Apple App Store were up 23 percent compared to September and slightly higher compared to last year, the mobile marketing tech company Fiksu reported as part of its App Store Competitive Index. Last fall’s numbers were buoyed by the release of the iPhone 6.