In the early 2000s, highly capable telephones were reserved for company executives and rich folk. Then, the first iPhone came out, signifying the increasing availability of “pocket computers” to the wider public.
And then app developers went wild.
Online banking, social media, games, streaming, food delivery…it seems all industries jumped in on the trend and, perhaps inadvertently, created a new multi-billion dollar industry.
But which apps are the most popular among them all?
Take a look at our mobile app market share statistics and find out.
Massive Mobile App Statistics (Editor’s Choice):
- At the end of 2022, the mobile app market boasted a $430 billion revenue.
- People will download mobile apps more than 235 billion times in 2022.
- Mobile apps account for 65% of people’s digital time.
- 70% of millennials admit spending time on social media apps is among the most important for them.
- The Google Play Store has more than 2.6 million apps.
- The Asia Pacific region holds 33.5% of the mobile app market.
- Mobile video games account for 70% of the total revenue.
- On its own, PUBG Mobile generates $2 billion in 2021.
Mobile App Market Share Statistics for 2022
Do you want to shave…but also not? There’s an app for that.
Do you wish someone would help you deal with awkward conversations? There’s an app for that, too.
Do you get tired of apps being so functional? You can download Nothing—an app that does exactly that: nothing.
So, yeah, when we say there’s an app for everything, we mean it. But let’s talk a bit more about the growth of mobile apps.
1. Mobile app time makes up 65% of total digital time.
(Source: Knowband)
On average, people spend 4.2 hours a day using various apps, but how much we use each type of app varies.
Statistics suggest that the average user spends most of their screen time listening to music (79%), monitoring their health (51%), and hanging out on social media (49%).
All in all, the majority of people in the US check their phones 160 times a day.
2. Asia Pacific has a 33.5% mobile app market share.
(Source: Persistence Market Research)
This makes it the region with the highest share of the market, and it’s likely to continue being the most prominent region until the end of the decade.
Japan and South Korea, for instance, will see a significant surge in demand for mobile apps (CAGRs of 18% and 16.5%, respectively).
For comparison, the British market will see a CAGR of 15%.
3. China has the biggest app market, boasting $156 billion in revenue.
(Source: Statista)
China has a thriving smartphone industry, more than a billion potential users, and a solid financial situation, which makes for a very good app marketplace.
As it is, China has the biggest app market share of all countries. The country’s app store catalog includes 2.5 million apps, basically ensuring that everybody can find what they’re looking for. Indeed, it seems they do, as the average Chinese user has 65 different apps on their mobile phone.
Which of those millions of apps is the most popular?
Short-form video-sharing apps, like Douyin (TikTok’s name in China). In fact, Chinese users spend about 39% of their total mobile phone usage time on these short-video sharing platforms.
4. Notion is the fastest-growing mobile app in 2022.
(Source: Turing)
Notion is essentially a digital workspace. It takes the #1 spot in the list of fastest-growing apps in terms of the number of customers—after experiencing a 240% growth, it now reached 30 million users.
TripActions (178%), Postman (173%), Figma (159%), and Miro (152%) follow behind.
Mobile App Market Share By Type
We at Web Tribunal already gave you a hint about which apps people seem to favor nowadays, but now it’s time to dive deeper.
5. As of June 2022, six out of the top 10 Android apps are mobile games.
(Source: Statista)
The Google Play Store has more than 2.6 million apps available—and out of all of those, Dessert DIY is currently the most popular one, boasting 21.88 million downloads.
It may sound like the type of mobile app to help you improve your cooking skills, but it’s actually a game about making desserts. In fact, there are five more games among the top 10 apps in Play Store:
- Bucket Crusher (21.5 million downloads)
- Dream Wedding (16.39 million)
- Pocket Monsters Rush (10.78 million)
- Apex Legend Mobile (9.45 million)
- Fruit Ninja (9.4 million)
Fun fact: Although 2.6 million apps sounds like a lot, there was a time when there were more. Specifically, the Google Play Store had over three million apps from mid-2017 until mid-2018.
6. With 11.25 million downloads, TikTok is the leading app on the App Store.
(Source: Statista)
While mobile games may be the most popular app category in the Android scene, social media is king on Apple devices, taking up six of the top 10 spots on the App Store.
After TikTok come:
- WhatsApp Messenger (8.77 million downloads)
- NGL: anonymous q&a (6.17 million)
- WeChat (5.61 million)
- Facebook (5.43 million)
- BeReal. Your friends for real. (5.31 million)
The last one is perhaps one of the best performers in terms of recent app growth rate, gaining global popularity in 2022. BeReal. Your friends for real. issues random requests to its users to take a selfie and post it without filters, supposedly encouraging them to be more authentic about themselves.
Fun fact: Although the App Store has more apps available than the Google Play Store (3.7 million vs. 2.6 million), it’s the latter’s apps that boast more downloads. For instance, let’s compare the #1 app on each store: TikTok has practically half the downloads Dessert DIY does.
7. TikTok is the best-performing social media app.
(Source: Business of Apps)
Yeah, hardly one of the most surprising mobile app industry trends you’ll find here, but still worth noting.
The social media apps that follow TikTok are:
- Tinder ($769 million)
- Line ($310 million)
- Bumble ($224 million)
- Kwai ($172 million)
The latter is a short-video sharing app, like TikTok. Depending on where you’re from, you may know it as Kuaishou or as Snack Video, but it’s still the same app, and it still boasts $11.3 billion in annual revenue.
Fun fact: Social networks are especially popular among millennials, with around 70% of them saying that social media apps are the ones they use the most. Unsurprisingly, other categories of apps that rank high fall in the messaging (55%) and gaming (42%) categories.
8. TikTok is also the highest-grossing entertainment app.
(Source: Business of Apps)
The top three in this category probably come as no surprise: TikTok ($1.7 billion), YouTube ($891 million), and Disney+ ($767 million).
The other two might come as a bit of a surprise, though—Tencent Video ($666 million) and Kakao Piccoma ($613 million). The former is the Chinese version of Netflix; the latter is a webtoon subscription service.
Fun fact: If we focus on the US alone, Disney+ is also the third highest-grossing app ($428 million). The top two are Roblox ($588 million) and Coin Master ($433 million).
9. Home Workout boasts 3.53 million downloads.
(Source: Statista)
Not everything revolves around video games. And the truth is that COVID-19 left quite the market for mobile apps that are fitness- and health-related.
As of June 2022, the most popular app in this category is Home Workout. Next up come:
- Six Pack in 30 days (3.47 million downloads)
- Huawei health (3.39 million)
- Lose Weight App for Men (2.01 million)
- Blood Pressure Monitor & Info (1.81 million)
Interestingly enough, none of them are at the top of the category when it comes to revenue. The honor goes to Paired: Couples & Relationship ($2.3 million), MagnaWave PEMF ($1.2 million), and FitBit ($1 million).
Fun fact: In 2020, mental health apps recorded around 215,000 downloads in just three days (November 3-5).
Mobile Apps Industry
It seems a bit weird to talk about a single mobile app industry when there are lots of apps for seemingly every industry.
Nevertheless, we’ll push past the weirdness and talk about the biggest players and how much they’re making.
10. By the end of 2022, mobile apps will generate $430.9 billion.
(Source: Statista)
Projections suggest that in-app purchases, such as microtransactions in mobile games, will amount to $204.9 billion by the end of 2022.
Advertising is another important source of revenue for apps, bringing in $220.8 billion.
For comparison, paid app revenue—that is, when people actually buy apps instead of downloading them for free—accounts for just $5.25 billion.
All in all, the global mobile app market revenue will likely add up to over $430 billion in 2022.
Fun fact: If projections are accurate, there will be 235 billion downloads throughout the year. That gives us an average of $1.83 per downloaded app.
11. 71% of app revenue boils down to mobile games.
(Source: Business of Apps)
This is hardly surprising, as more than 1.01 billion people admit to playing online games.
Furthermore, mobile games encourage users to make small in-game purchases. For instance, Roblox players spend an average of $15 a month on Robux (the game’s virtual currency), generating more than $1 billion yearly for developers.
Now, what about apps that aren’t games? How much do they make?
Well, music streaming apps boast a combined revenue of $25.1 billion in 2021. On the other hand, travel apps generate a combined $88 million from in-app purchases and $333 million in total revenue.
12. PUBG Mobile brought in $2 billion in 2021.
(Source: Business of Apps)
One of the strongest gaming mobile app companies is most certainly Tencent Games. It owns PUBG Mobile, which boasts 30 million players, over one billion downloads, and over $6.3 billion in lifetime revenue.
Tencent Games is also behind another top-grossing app: Honor of Kings. In 2021, the game generated $1.64 billion in revenue and $265 million in monthly player spending.
So, it’s hardly surprising that Tencent accounts for 15% of the world’s gaming revenue.
Fun fact: Tencent doesn’t just create games for mobile devices; it’s also behind other popular apps, such as WeChat (social media), Tencent Video (streaming), or VooV Meeting (video conferencing). In fact, mobile app statistics show that 98% of the people in China use at least one of Tencent’s apps.
13. In Q2 2022, King game development studio generated $684 million.
(Source: Statista)
The name itself may not ring any bells, but you certainly know Candy Crush Saga or Bubble Witch Saga—King’s best-performing products.
Activision Blizzard—the publisher behind Call of Duty, Overwatch, and Diablo—bought King studios for $5.9 billion back in 2016. Nowadays, the company boasts $9 billion in annual revenue. The most impressive part?
Three games in the publisher’s catalog are responsible for 76% of that total ($6 billion): Candy Crush, World of Warcraft, and Call of Duty.
14. Konstant Infosolutions is the best Indian app developer with $16+ million in revenue.
(Source: Business of Apps)
Konstant Infosolutions is one of the best mobile app development companies in India and one of the top 10 in the world in 2020. The company’s client portfolio includes prominent names such as the United Nations and Volkswagen.
Other companies that feature in the world's top 10 include Dev.Pro, Blue Bell Labs, Fueled, Intellectsoft, and VironIT.
Wrap Up
Mobile apps are a thriving industry, although the inherent limits of smartphones might hamper their full expansion.
The mobile app market share is unlikely to change. Casual games and social media will probably continue to rule the mobile app scene. Although, after the pandemic, health and remote collaboration apps do seem to be on the rise.
All in all, we’re probably going to see an increase in both app use and revenues.
Sources
Unaware that life beyond the internet exists, Nick is poking servers and control panels, playing with WordPress add-ons, and helping people get the hosting that suits them.
