Mobile Games Now Account For 10% Of Time Spent And 74% Of Consumer Spending

Mobile gaming remains one of the most favorite activities of smartphone users, accounting for 10 percent of the total time spent in apps. This figure has been steady for years even during the past two years we have spent 50 percent more time in apps. Furthermore, people are spending more time on mobile games, according to a new research report from App Annie revealed during E3.

Screen time: Significant but not leading

In 2019, mobile games have reached 60 percent of market share regarding consumer spending, thanks to the growing cross-platform, hyper-casual gaming.

In the new report, App Annie looks into the amount of time users spend playing games compared with other apps, monetization, as well as regional highlights in the gaming market, along with many others.

According to the report, while games occupy a considerable amount of screen time, they still can’t overtake other categories. In fact, as of 2018, half of the time users around the world spent on their phones involved communication and social apps. Meanwhile, video editors and players made up 15 percent, and games accounted for 10 percent.

On average, US users install eight games on their devices, and the figure for global users is between two and five games each month.

In total, year over year, a user spent 10 percent more time on games, which results from existing gamers who are playing games more and using a broadening user base with a lot of new mobile gamers. This has also led to a wider range of age among gamers.

Today, gamers at 25 and older are those accounting for the majority of time spent in games. App Annie found out that many of them don’t even call themselves gamers.

Consumer spending: Dominating

Games may not lead in terms of screen time, but they do occupy plenty of mobile downloads and consumer spending on phones. Google Play, iOS, and third-party app stores make up one-third of downloads across the globe. In 2018, Google Play saw over 1.6 million new games and iOS witness the addition of another 1.1 million games.

Android users spend 74 cents of each dollar on games, 95 percent of which is in-app purchases, not for downloads. There were no figures on iOS users.

While Google Play has more downloads than iOS, its consumer spend is slow. As of last year, 72 percent of global downloads went to Google Play and the other 28 percent went to iOS. However, Google Play grabbed only 36 percent of consumer spending, but iOS grabbed 64 percent.

Downloads: Growing fast

Among the games played, racing games were outstanding, which grew 7.9 times as quickly as the overall market. Adventure ran behind with a growth of 5 times as fast as the average market. Music and board games did a good job too.

App Annie revealed that mobile gaming is the largest channels like computers, handled consoles, and home game consoles. Even when all of these categories combine, mobile games still outrun them by 20 percent, thanks to the growth of mobile user base over that past few years.

Today, cross-platform gaming is the key trend, with Fortnite and PUBG in the lead, the most downloaded games in several markets as of 2018. On the other hand, hyper-casual games attract those who don’t consider themselves gamers, helping the market to spread wider.

According to App Annie’s prediction, AR gaming could be the next big wave, with games like Harry Potter: Wizards Unite which may bring Pokémon Go-like frenzy back to augmented reality, bringing $100 million after the first 30 days. Right now, the game is under beta tests for selected markets, with the released planned for 2019.

Regions: China in the lead

While China seems to have the greatest impacts on mobile gaming, its 2018 growth didn’t bloom resulting from the game license regulations, which caused publishers to explore markets outside of China, such as Japan and North America.

Meanwhile, in terms of games downloads, Russia, Indonesia, Brazil, and India are in front of this, but China and the US are still strong players.

Based on the steadily continuous growth regarding consumer spending and time spent on mobile games, App Annie says that the potential to monetize games is growing. Over a period from 2016 to 2018, there were 700 more games making over $5 million (1,200 games as opposed to 1,900 games). Furthermore, a lot of markets are experiencing an increase in consumer spending, with the US growing by 45 percent and China growing by 105 percent.