European mobile app users spent $18.3 billion in 2021

Mobile app users in Europe spent  $18.3 billion across the App Store and Google Play in 2021, up 22.8% YoY as compared to gross revenue from 2020, according to Sensor Tower. 

European spending accounted for around 14% of global mobile app spending in 2021, reaching $131.6 billion.

The App Store led most of user spending in Europe with gross revenue of $9.8 billion in 2021, up 22.5 percent year-over-year, while Google Play revenue increased by 23.2% year-over-year to $8.5 billion.

When it comes to mobile app downloads, the App Store and Google Play generated 27.4 billion unique installs last year, down 3.9% year-over-year.

As is generally the case around the world, Google Play had more downloads than the App Store in Europe in 2021, with more than 20.2 billion installs, down 4.3 percent year-over-year. The App Store generated 7.2 billion downloads, marking a year-on-year decline of 2.7 percent.

The European country with the highest app revenue in 2021 was the UK, which generated $3.5 billion in user spend across the App Store and Google Play, up 23.2% year-over-year. While Germany came close behind with $3.4 billion with an increase of 22.5%, France ranked 3rd by accruing $2 billion with an increase of 14.7%.

When it comes to app downloads, Russia ranked #1 with 5.9 billion downloads in 2021, down 2.5% YoY, followed by Turkey with 3.9 billion downloads in 2021, down 1.5% YoY. 

Mobile games generated $11.2 billion in revenue in Europe in 2021, up 16.7 percent year-over-year. In total, games accounted for around 61% of all mobile app revenue in Europe, based on user spending.

Globally, the App Store generated more game revenue than Google Play, while in Europe the opposite was true. Google Play users spent $6.4 billion in Europe in 2021, an increase of 18.5 percent from the previous year, while the App Store generated $ 4.8 billion, an increase of 14.3 percent from player spending. 

Overall, Google Play represented 57.5 percent of total game revenue in Europe, while the App Store accounted for 42.5 percent, per the report.

Germany ranked #1 in player spending with $1.3 billion in 2021, followed by  the U.K, and France.