2024 Incredible App Statistics

In this day and age, people can no longer function without their smartphones, and the numbers prove it.

We’ve come to rely on our phones for the most basic tasks and for the most mundane chores. We’ve also used our phones to entertain ourselves in waiting rooms, in flights, or even right in our houses.

With people using mobile apps left and right, just how big is the mobile app industry? How divided is the mobile app market? What are the mobile app usage statistics looking like?

This article will answer those questions and more.

Key Mobile App Statistics

• There are more than 6.3 billion smartphone users and 1.14 billion tablet users around the world [1], [2].
• We spend 88% of our time on mobile apps when we’re on our mobile phones [4].
• Consumer spending on mobile apps for Q1 2022 hit $33 billion, a significant decrease compared to Q4 2021’s $70 billion [13].
• Consumer spending is projected to reach $115.4 billion for Apple App Store and $55.5 billion for Google Play Store by the end of 2024 [7].
• Average consumer spending for Q1 2022 is $5.03, a significant decrease from $10.64 in Q4 2021 [12].
• Consumer spending for Google Play Store reached $38.6 billion in 2020 [5].
• Google Play Store generated $48 billion in revenues for all of their mobile apps [20].
• Users averaged 18.78 minutes playing mobile games in 2020, and 20.4 minutes on average on all app categories [22].
• Android users from Asia clocked the highest number of hours using social media apps in 2021. Users spent a total of 449 billion hours for that time period [24].
• Mobile app downloads for 2021 totaled to 230 billion for all platforms [25].

Mobile Apps Industry Overview

• There are more than 6.3 billion smartphone users around the world, and it’s no wonder why the mobile app industry is just as big as it is now [1].
• There are 1.14 billion tablet users around the world, showing a 36% growth over the span of six years [2].
• The average person in the USA uses their phone 262 times in a day, or once every 5.5 minutes [3].
• 88% of our time spent using the phones are spent on mobile apps [4].

From a business perspective, there’s no real surprise here on why a lot of companies are developing their own apps. People use phones at home, in restaurants, at work, and pretty much everywhere as long as there’s a signal.

For app developers, the numbers tell them two things.

• There are enough mobile users out there to justify creating a mobile app for something.
• There are enough mobile app users out there who need to use a specific kind of app.

App Revenue Statistics

• Global spending for mobile apps hit $111 billion in 2020, which was up 30% from the previous year. This spending included in-app purchases, premium app access, and subscriptions spanning both Google Play and Apple App Stores [5].
• In 2016, mobile app revenues reached $365 billion and is projected to increase more than double the amount to $935.2 billion by the end of 2023 [6].
• It’s projected that consumer app spending will hit $115.4 billion for Apple App Store and $55.5 billion for Google Play by the year 2024 [7].
• Coin Master is the #1 mobile game in the Google Play Store, generating revenue of up to $113.89 back in 2020. Their developer, Moon Active, is also one of the top mobile gaming app developers for the same year [8].
• In 2019, Google Play Store had 3.3 million apps and Apple App Store had 2.2 million apps [9].
• Average consumer spending for mobile apps per phone is $4.64 by the end of Q3 2020 [10].
• App stores in China had about 3.67 million apps in 2020. That number has probably increased [11].
• During the Q1 of 2022, average consumer spend was $5.03, which is significantly down from the $10.64 average spending in Q4 2021 [12].
• Total value consumer spend on mobile apps for Q1 of 2022 was $33 billion, which is a significant decrease from the $70 billion earned in Q4 of 2021 [13].
• Global revenue from mobile apps increased to $318 billion in 2020, which is a $60 billion increase from 2019. Mobile games was the strongest segment for that year, generating more than $200 billion in revenue, followed by social media apps with $31 billion [14].
• Google Play Store generated $37 billion in revenue from mobile gaming apps, while Apple App store generated $52.3 billion in revenue [15].

iOS Revenue Statistics

• Global consumer spending for Apple App store was $72.3 billion in 2020, which was a significant increase from $55.3 billion in 2019 [5].
• Apple App Store had 87% more consumer spending than Google Play Store, but both platforms were on track for their Year on Year Growth for 2021 [5].
• Apple App Store revenue for 2021 was 85.1 billion, combining revenue from in-app purchases, subscriptions, and premium apps [16].
• The average cost of iOS games and apps is $1 ($0.88 for apps, and $0.49 for games) [17].
• Tinder is the highest grossing mobile app in the Apple App Store for the month of June 2022. Their revenue was $38.4 million for that month. Tiktok came in second place with $29.2 million in revenue and Pokemon Go in third place with $25 million for the same period of observance [17].

Google Play Store Revenue Statistics

• Consumer spending for Google Play Store hit $38.6 billion in 2020, a slight increase from $29.7 billion earned in 2019 [5].
• The number of mobile apps available to Google Play and Android mobile users increased by 6% during Q2 2022, compared to Q1 2022’s almost 30% dismal drop [18].
• There are 3.5 million apps available to Android users from the Google Play Store in Q2 2022, a slight increase compared to the previous quarter’s 3.2 million [19].
• Google Play Store earned $48 billion in gross revenues for all their mobile apps, showing a 23% increase compared to the previous year’s $38.8 billion in revenue [20].

App User Statistics

• Comic book apps had the highest one day user retention at 33.8%, but significantly dropped to 9.3% for 30 day retention. News apps retained 13.3% of users for one day and after thirty days of installing [21].
• User session for 2020 averaged at 18.78 minutes for gaming alone and 20.4 minutes on all categories. This meant that mobile users spent more time on gaming apps than on any other app by a huge margin [22].
• 81% of iOS users spent most of their time streaming videos, TV shows, and movies compared to 78% of Android users doing the same activity [23].
• 81% of iOS users spent more of their time playing mobile games compared 78% of Android users [23].
• Android users in Asia spent the highest number of hours on social media apps for 2021 with 449 billion hours clocked. South America Android users spent 84.4 billion on social media for 2021 [24].

Total App Downloads Statistics

• Mobile app downloads worldwide hit 230 billion in 2021, which was a 12 billion increase from 2020’s 218 billion downloads [25].
• During Q1 of 2022, Google Play Store had 28.3 billion downloads for its apps compared to 8.5 billion downloads from Apple App Store [26].
• During Q1 of 2022, there was a total of 14.4 billion downloads from mobile games alone for both platforms (Androidn and iOS) [27].

iOS Downloads Statistics

• 2.18 million apps are available in the Apple App Store for Q2 2022. It’s a 5% increase compared to the previous quarter [28].
• TikTok remains one of the most download app for iPhone as of June 2022. For the time period, the app generated 11.3 million downloads or so. WhatsApp is the second most downloaded app with 5.8 million downloads recorded for that time period [29].
• As of March 2022, there are more than 1 million gaming apps found in the Apple App Store and more than 3.79 non-gaming apps [30].

Google Play Store Downloads Statistics

• In June 2022, the most downloaded apps belong to the Mobile Gaming category. Dessert DIY was the most downloaded app in the Google Play Store with more than 22 million downloads from its users. Bucket Crusher comes in close second with 21.5 million downloads [31].
• In June 2022, there were 90,000 new mobile apps released in the Google Play Store. This was a slight decrease compared to 134,500 new apps recorded back in May 2019 [32].
• For Q2 2022, more than 3.65 million apps are available on the Google Play Store, which is a 6% increase from the previous quarter [33].
• In June 2022, the most downloaded social media app is NGL or Not Gonna Life for Android users. For that month, the app generated 11 million downloads. Likee comes in second place with 5.8 million downloads worldwide [34].

The Wrap Up

As you can see from the numbers above, the mobile app industry is only going to get bigger and bigger within the next few years. App usage will always be at an all-time high given our complete reliance on smartphones and tablets.

The mobile app market will always be a close fight between Google Play Store and Apple App Store. And with more mobile devices becoming more powerful each year, app users should be getting the most out of any apps, be it gaming or non-gaming.

References

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/330695/number-of-smartphone-users-worldwide/

[2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/377977/tablet-users-worldwide-forecast/

[3] https://www.reviews.org/mobile/cell-phone-addiction/

[4] https://www.insiderintelligence.com/content/the-majority-of-americans-mobile-time-spent-takes-place-in-apps

[5] https://sensortower.com/blog/app-revenue-and-downloads-2020

[6] https://www.statista.com/forecasts/1262892/mobile-app-revenue-worldwide-by-segment

[7] https://sensortower.com/blog/sensor-tower-app-market-forecast-2024

[8] https://airnowplc.com/

[9] https://www.businessofapps.com/guide/app-stores-list/

[10] https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2020-october-global-statshot

[11] http://www.cnnic.cn/hlwfzyj/hlwxzbg/hlwtjbg/202004/P020200428399188064169.pdf

[12] https://www.statista.com/statistics/289909/mobile-app-spend-on-per-user-mobile-apps-quarter/

[13] https://www.statista.com/statistics/266275/mobile-app-consumer-spend-on-mobile-apps-quarter/

[14] https://www.statista.com/forecasts/1262892/mobile-app-revenue-worldwide-by-segment

[15] https://www.statista.com/statistics/266489/earnings-forecast-for-mobile-apps-providers/

[16] https://www.statista.com/statistics/296226/annual-apple-app-store-revenue/

[17] https://www.statista.com/statistics/267346/average-apple-app-store-price-app/

[18] https://www.statista.com/statistics/185729/google-play-quarterly-growth-of-available-apps/

[19] https://www.statista.com/statistics/289418/number-of-available-apps-in-the-google-play-store-quarter/

[20] https://www.statista.com/statistics/444476/google-play-annual-revenue/

[21] https://www.statista.com/statistics/259329/ios-and-android-app-user-retention-rate/

[22] https://www.statista.com/statistics/243779/total-minutes-spent-on-average-app-by-category/

[23] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1265453/app-activities-worldwide-by-platform/

[24] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1268491/global-time-spent-social-apps-by-region/

[25] https://www.statista.com/statistics/271644/worldwide-free-and-paid-mobile-app-store-downloads/

[26] https://www.statista.com/statistics/695094/quarterly-number-of-mobile-app-downloads-store/

[27] https://www.statista.com/statistics/661553/global-app-stores-mobile-game-downloads/

[28] https://www.statista.com/statistics/779768/number-of-available-apps-in-the-apple-app-store-quarter/

[29] https://www.statista.com/statistics/695791/top-iphone-apps-worldwide-by-number-of-downloads/

[30] https://www.statista.com/statistics/268251/number-of-apps-in-the-itunes-app-store-since-2008/

[31] https://www.statista.com/statistics/693944/leading-android-apps-worldwide-by-downloads/

[32] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1020956/android-app-releases-worldwide/

[33] https://www.statista.com/statistics/289418/number-of-available-apps-in-the-google-play-store-quarter/

[34] https://www.statista.com/statistics/263919/most-popular-mobile-apps-worldwide-sorted-by-reach/