App Spending Surges to $64.9B in H1 2021, Install Growth Slows

Record Mobile App Spending in First Half of 2021, Despite Slowing Growth

Preliminary data from Sensor Tower, an app store intelligence company, indicates that consumer expenditure within mobile applications reached a high of $64.9 billion during the initial six months of 2021.

This figure signifies a 24.8% increase in spending across both the App Store and Google Play when contrasted with the corresponding period in the previous year.

Growth Rate Moderation

Industry analysts anticipate that the accelerated adoption of mobile technology, spurred by the pandemic, will persist as a prevailing trend. However, it's important to acknowledge that, despite achieving a new record, the rate of growth in consumer spending has experienced a slight deceleration.

Furthermore, the expansion in app downloads has slowed at a more pronounced rate.

For context, consumer spending on mobile apps increased by 28.4% from the first half of 2019 to the first half of 2020, rising from $40.5 billion to $52 billion – a faster pace than the 24.8% observed in the current period.

Platform Performance

The Apple App Store accounted for $41.5 billion in global consumer spending during the first half of 2021, which is 1.8 times the $23.4 billion generated by Google Play.

Nevertheless, Google Play continues to demonstrate stronger growth, experiencing a 30% increase from $18 billion in the first half of 2020, compared to the 22.1% growth observed on the App Store, which reached $34 billion.

This is partially attributable to demand originating from markets such as the Philippines, where pandemic-related business closures and quarantines have been prevalent, as noted by Sensor Tower.

Spending Categories and Top Apps

Outside of gaming, consumer spending was primarily driven by applications in the sports, finance, business, book, and entertainment categories.

Subscription-based apps within the top 100 (excluding games) contributed significantly, generating $8.3 billion during this period.

TikTok remained a top-grossing app in the first half of 2021, followed by YouTube and consistently high-earning Tinder.

Mobile Gaming Dominance

Mobile game spending continues to represent the largest portion of overall consumer expenditure, reaching $44.7 billion during the first half of the year.

The App Store accounted for $26 billion of this total, but growth decelerated from 26.5% in the year-ago period to 13.5% from the first half of 2020 to the first half of 2021.

The top-grossing games in the first half of 2021, in order, were Tencent’s Honor of Kings ($15 billion+), PUBG Mobile (including its localized Chinese version, reaching nearly $1.5 billion), Genshin Impact ($848 million+), Roblox, and Coin Master.

Slowing Download Growth

The firm also discovered a substantial slowdown in mobile app download growth during the first half of this year.

The COVID-19 pandemic in the previous year led to a surge in new mobile app installations globally, as consumers turned to apps for work, education, shopping, health, and groceries.

App installs increased by 25.7% year-over-year to 71.3 billion downloads during the first half of 2020. However, in the first half of 2021, downloads only grew by 1.7% to reach 72.5 billion installs.

Platform-Specific Download Trends

The App Store experienced a year-over-year decline in non-game installs in the first half of 2021, dropping 10.9% to 16.3 billion from 18.3 billion in the first half of 2020.

Sensor Tower attributes this to increased competition for consumer attention in markets with a high concentration of iOS users, such as the U.S., where businesses have been reopening and in-person activities are resuming.

Meanwhile, Google Play (non-game) installs climbed 6% in the first half of this year to 56.2 billion from 53 billion in the first half of 2020.

This could be linked to the demand for apps in markets where Android is dominant, like India, which has continued to be affected by the pandemic.

Consequently, app adoption on Google Play was 3.5 times higher than on the App Store during the first half of 2021.

Top Downloaded Apps

TikTok was the most downloaded (non-game) app, gaining 384.6 million new installs during the first half of this year.

However, this represents a decrease of approximately 38% from the 619 million installs it saw during the year-ago period, a change attributed to its ban in the Indian market last year.

The remaining top 5 most downloaded apps were dominated by Facebook, with Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp securing the No. 2, No. 3, and No. 4 positions, respectively.

Telegram was No. 5, followed by Messenger, Zoom, Snapchat, CapCut, and Google Meet.

Mobile game downloads, meanwhile, fell 22.8% to 4.4 billion on the App Store but grew 3.9% on Google Play to 23.7 billion in the first half of 2021.

The app data presented is a preliminary analysis and may be refined over time. Comparing it to reports from other firms will provide a more comprehensive understanding.