The turnover of the mobile games market reached $90 billion in 2021 — the main thing from the reports of Sensor Tower and App Annie
Sensor Tower and App Annie have presented their reports on the global mobile games market for 2021. According to both companies, users spent almost $90 billion on mobile titles. Analysts also shared their own data on the most downloaded and cash projects.Genshin Impact
The main thing from the Sensor Tower report
In 2021, user spending on mobile games reached $89.6 billion, which is 12.6% more in annual terms.
- This is also 67.4% of the expenses for all mobile applications.
- At the same time, mobile titles accounted for 71.7% of all user expenses last year.iOS users accounted for $52.3 billion of the total revenue of mobile games — an increase of 9.9% year-on-year.
- And Android users spent $37.3 billion on games, which is 16.6% more compared to 2020.The highest-grossing game in the App Store was Honor of Kings, which generated $2.9 billion on the Apple platform in 2021.
- The first place in revenue in Google Play was taken by Coin Master with a result of $ 912 million.The highest-grossing mobile games of 2021 (excluding data from third-party Android stores)
Mobile game downloads reached 55.3 billion, which is 1.6% less compared to 2020.
- Most of the downloads came from Google Play — 46.7 billion.The first place in downloads on Android went to Garena Free Fire — 218.8 million installations (14% less in annual terms).
- PUBG Mobile has become the leader in the App Store along with its Chinese version Game for Peace — 47.5 million downloads (18.5% less in annual terms).The most downloaded mobile games of 2021 (excluding data from third-party Android stores)
The main thing from the App Annie report
Analysts did not name the exact turnover of the mobile games market, but estimated it at about $90 billion.
- Bridge Race has become the leader in the growth of downloads in 2021.
- Next came the Hair Challenge and Count Masters. Also in the top ten were Project Makeover and High Heels. The latter has surpassed the 100 million downloads mark in just 11 months.The largest revenue growth was shown by Genshin Impact, Uma Musume Pretty Derby and Roblox.
- The fourth place went to Project Makeover — this is a great achievement, since almost all titles in this chart belong to midcore or hardcore genres.Separately, App Annie noted the success of League of Legends: Wild Rift.
- In just a year, the project’s revenue exceeded $150 million. Of all the mobile MOBA, only Honor of Kings has achieved this achievement faster.Note: App Annie charts are formed not based on the total number of downloads or revenue, but depending on the growth of these metrics over the reporting period
In the strategy genre, 4X March Battle, a hybrid of 4X strategies and battlers, showed the greatest growth in revenue.
- User spending on games in this category has increased by 32% since the beginning of 2021 thanks to hits such as Top War and State of Survival.The fastest growing subgenre of role—playing games has become RPG in the open world – their revenue has grown by 500% since the beginning of the year, largely thanks to Genshin Impact.
- Also, since the beginning of 2021, user spending in MMORPG has increased by 21%.In the category of simulators, the revenue of the Idol Training Sim subgenre (for example, Uma Musume Pretty Derby) increased by 110%, and user spending on sandboxes (Roblox) increased by 57% since the beginning of the year.
