The Windows Phone Marketplace has just hit another milestone: 50,000 apps. It actually hit that mark over a month ago on November 17. At the moment, Microsoft gives an official count of "more than 35,000" apps in the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Microsoft have previously siad that they don't count extremely simple apps such as wallpapers or multiple versions (as in a paid version of the game, as well as the lite/demo version) as individual apps, which explains the big discrepancy between the official number and the estimate.

50,000 may sound like a lot, but compared to Microsoft's competition, Apple and Google, it's really nothing. Apple's App Store and Google's Android Market house 600,000 and 500,000 apps, respectively. Microsoft reached 50,000 apps quicker than any other market bar Apple's App Store, in just 14 months. For comparison sake, Android took 19 months to reach 50,000 apps.

The number of apps growing at a rate of 265 items per day.