Maya Robertson
According to Sensor Tower’s newly released Q1 2024 Mobile Market Overview report, consumer spending across the App Store and Google Play surpassed $35 billion in a single quarter for the first time ever. This milestone represents a 9.5% year-over-year increase and a 3.4% rise from the previous record set in Q4 2023.
Despite a slower recovery compared to apps, mobile gaming spending showed promising signs. For the first time in two years, mobile game spending exceeded $20 billion, reflecting nearly 3% year-over-year growth. In comparison, non-game apps generated $15.5 billion in consumer spending, marking a substantial 19.4% increase from the previous year.
Consumer spending growth on iOS outpaced that on Google Play, with increases of 11.5% and 5.3% year-over-year, respectively. Notably, while non-game apps experienced higher growth rates on Google Play, iOS continued to lead in monetizing through in-app purchases. Mobile game spending on iOS saw a robust return to positive growth with nearly 6% year-over-year increase, while Google Play’s gaming spending remained relatively flat compared to the previous year.
App downloads witnessed a 3.5% decline in Q1 2024, marking the third consecutive year of first-quarter decreases since peaking in Q1 2021. Despite this downward trend, download volumes remain more than 20% higher than pre-pandemic levels in Q1 2019. Mobile games experienced a more significant decline, with downloads falling nearly 7% year-over-year due to the ongoing challenges in the competitive casual gaming market.
iOS demonstrated modest but steady download growth in recent years, with Q1 2024 downloads reaching approximately 8.4 million, the highest total since Q2 2020. Conversely, Google Play experienced a 5.2% year-over-year decline in Q1 2024 downloads, largely correcting from the exceptional growth observed during the pandemic’s onset. Nevertheless, Q1 2024’s total of 25.6 billion downloads on Google Play is 25% higher than the 20.5 billion downloads recorded in Q1 2019, underscoring the platform’s dominance with 75% of total downloads.
The United States led global consumer spending on iOS and Google Play, with $12.4 billion spent in Q1 2024. Mainland China followed with $6 billion in consumer spending on iOS alone, as Google Play remains unavailable in this market. While the US and UK saw significant growth, Asian markets like Japan experienced a 17% year-over-year decline, contributing to an overall 2.5% drop in consumer spending in Asia. In contrast, North America and Europe saw consumer spending growth of 16% and 24%, respectively.
All top app categories experienced increased consumer spending in Q1 2024, with several categories rising by over 30% year-over-year. Entertainment apps led the charge, surpassing $4.1 billion in spending, up 18% from the previous year. This category includes popular apps like TikTok and video streaming services such as Disney+ and Max. Productivity, Music, and Photo & Video apps also saw substantial growth, each increasing by at least 30% year-over-year. Google One maintained its leadership among Productivity apps, with the category bolstered by the rising interest in generative AI applications like ChatGPT.
Comments
Loading…