Mobile App Industry Statistics 2026: Revenue, Downloads and Stores

Revenue from in-app purchases and paid apps and games reached $167 billion in 2025 across iOS and Google Play, a 10.6% increase, according to Sensor Tower. Total downloads across iOS and Google Play edged up 0.8% to nearly 150 billion, so spending grew more than 13 times as fast as downloads. Those mobile app industry statistics point to one shift: revenue per existing user, not new installs, now moves the market.

The store figures cover only what people pay through iOS and Google Play. Apple says the global App Store ecosystem facilitated over $1.4 trillion in developer billings and sales in 2025. Most of that is physical goods and services bought inside apps. The figures below separate store spending, Apple’s ecosystem estimate, company revenue lines and the device base, each traced to the organization that published it.

Key Takeaways

• In-app purchase (IAP) revenue from non-gaming apps surpassed games for the first time, with non-game IAP revenue up 21% year over year in 2025.
• Physical goods and services made up 79% of App Store ecosystem billings and sales in 2025, against 10% for digital goods and services.
• Global IAP revenue reached $43.6 billion in Q2 2026, up 5.3% year over year, despite flat downloads.
• Generative AI app downloads doubled to 3.8 billion in 2025, while their IAP revenue nearly tripled to exceed $5 billion.
• Apple’s App Review team evaluated more than 9.1 million app submissions in 2025 and rejected over 2 million.
• About nine-in-ten US adults, 91%, own a smartphone, according to Pew Research Center’s 2025 survey.

Editor’s Choice

• IAP revenue on iOS and Google Play, 2025: $167 billion.
• App downloads on iOS and Google Play, 2025: nearly 150 billion.
• Time spent in iOS and Google Play apps, 2025: 5.3 trillion hours.
• App Store ecosystem billings and sales, 2025: over $1.4 trillion.
• Smartphone subscriptions worldwide, 2025: 7,470 million.
• Policy-violating apps kept off Google Play, 2025: over 1.75 million.

Mobile App Industry Statistics: Market Size and Spending

• IAP revenue reached $167 billion in 2025, up 10.6%, as downloads, IAP revenue and time spent each hit all-time highs in 2025, according to Sensor Tower’s State of Mobile 2026 report.
• The United States remained the largest market for app store spending, with consumers spending nearly $60 billion in 2025.
• US consumers accounted for just under 36% of 2025 store spending.
• Western European markets also contributed to the growth, led by the United Kingdom, Germany and France.
• Mobile game IAP revenue approached $82 billion in 2025, up 1.3%.

Source: Sensor Tower State of Mobile 2026

About This Data

• Compiled from 12 sources: 8 company releases, filings, studies and help pages from Apple and Google, 2 Sensor Tower market reports, 1 Ericsson industry report and 1 Pew Research Center survey.
• Sources were published between November 2025 and August 2026.
• Only data published by the organization that measured or modelled it qualified; third-party market-research forecasts were excluded, and Ericsson’s 2031 subscription forecast is labelled as a forecast.
• Figures are reviewed on a rolling basis and updated when sources publish new editions.

How big is the mobile app industry?

Revenue from in-app purchases and paid apps and games reached $167 billion in 2025 across iOS and Google Play, according to Sensor Tower. A wider measure is far larger: Apple puts its App Store ecosystem at over $1.4 trillion in developer billings and sales for 2025, with sales of physical goods and services at $1.1 trillion.

Mobile App Revenue Growth by Segment

• Global IAP revenue reached $43.6 billion in Q2 2026, up 5.3%, as non-gaming IAP revenue hit a record $24.4 billion, up 14.6% year over year, according to Sensor Tower’s Q2 2026 Digital Market Index.
• That growth cushioned a 4.5% decline in gaming revenue.
• Consumer spending on generative AI apps more than doubled, up 108% year over year in Q2 2026.
• Mainland China added $519 million on iOS, and the UK, Germany and France collectively added $500 million across iOS and Google Play.

Recent Developments

• July 15, 2026: Google told Play developers to register any remaining apps by September 30, 2026, after 99% of apps on Play were registered automatically.
• Q2 2026: Alphabet’s Google subscriptions, platforms, and devices revenue grew 15% in the quarter ended June 30, 2026.
• July 30, 2026: Apple reported fiscal 2026 third-quarter revenue of $109.4 billion, up 16% year over year.
• August 11, 2026: Sensor Tower’s quarterly index showed that Google Play outpaced iOS in revenue momentum in Q2 2026, up 10% against 3%.
• September 30, 2026: Android developer verification protections were set to take effect, starting with users in Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand.
• September 30, 2026: Google Play’s new service fee structure was due to take effect in Australia and Japan, after a June 30, 2026 start in the European Economic Area, UK and US.

Mobile App Downloads and Time Spent

• Consumers spent 5.3 trillion hours across iOS and Google Play apps in 2025, up 3.8%, or roughly 3.6 hours per day per mobile user.
• Time spent in the US rose a modest 4% year over year, rebounding after signs of digital fatigue emerged in 2024.
• Credit and lending app downloads climbed 18% year over year, offsetting a decline in investing and cryptocurrency apps.
• Global sports betting app downloads increased 24% year over year as the category launched in new markets like Brazil.
• Restaurant and food delivery apps saw 14% growth year over year.

How many apps are downloaded each year?

Total downloads across iOS and Google Play edged up 0.8% in 2025 to nearly 150 billion, surpassing the previous high from 2023, by Sensor Tower’s count. Installs have plateaued near that level while spending keeps climbing, so store revenue is now growing far faster than installs.

Mobile Game vs Non-Game App Revenue

• Mobile game revenue grew for a third consecutive year in 2025, with IAP revenue approaching $82 billion.
• Non-game IAP revenue climbed 21% year over year in 2025 and passed games for the first time.
• Puzzle games surged 17% year over year in Q2 2026 to surpass $4 billion in IAP revenue, closing in on Strategy at $4.4 billion.
• Puzzle was the only major mobile game genre to achieve positive download growth in Q2 2026, at 1%.

Source: Sensor Tower State of Mobile 2026; Sensor Tower Q2 2026 Digital Market Index

Why it matters: Non-game IAP revenue reached nearly three times the amount spent just five years earlier, Sensor Tower found. A weak quarter for games no longer drags the whole market down, because subscriptions and purchases in non-game apps now carry most of the growth in store spending.

Generative AI App Statistics

• Generative AI app downloads doubled year over year to 3.8 billion in 2025.
• Time spent in generative AI apps reached 48 billion hours in 2025, roughly 3.6x the 2024 total and nearly 10x the 2023 level.
• ChatGPT’s mobile in-app revenue reached $1.4 billion in Q2 2026, up 82% year over year.
• Anthropic’s Claude grew mobile revenue 4X quarter over quarter in Q2 2026 to enter the global top 10 grossing non-gaming apps.

Source: Sensor Tower State of Mobile 2026; Sensor Tower Q2 2026 Digital Market Index

App Store Ecosystem Billings and Sales

• Developers did not pay any commission to Apple on more than 90% of the billings and sales facilitated by the App Store ecosystem.
• Developer billings and sales for digital goods and services totaled $149 billion in 2025, driven by games, enterprise apps and video streaming apps.
• In-app advertising revenue from ads placed by developers in their apps was $151 billion.
• The App Store saw over 850 million average weekly users spanning 175 countries and regions.
• More than 40 of the top 100 apps on the App Store featured consumer-facing AI capabilities in 2025.

Within the physical share, general retail accounted for $673 billion, or 47% of the total, with travel at $165 billion and food delivery and pickup at $120 billion.

By the numbers: Since 2019, App Store billings and sales of digital goods and services more than doubled (2.4x), physical goods and services nearly tripled (2.8x), and in-app advertising revenue grew 2.9x, according to Analysis Group. Shopping, travel and delivery inside apps have grown faster than the digital purchases the store itself bills.

App Store Ecosystem by Region

• Billings and sales facilitated by the App Store ecosystem totaled $562 billion in China in 2025, against $453 billion in the US.
• In China, general retail reached $363 billion, 65% of China’s total billings and sales.
• General retail made up 37% of total billings and sales in both the US and Europe, and 22% in Japan.
• Compared with other regions, digital goods and services represented a higher share of spending in Japan, at 28%, against closer to 15% in the US and Europe.

App Store Review and Fraud Statistics

• Apple prevented over $2.2 billion in potentially fraudulent transactions in 2025, adding to more than $11.2 billion over the past six years.
• The App Review process helped welcome over 306,000 new developers to the platform in 2025.
• Rejected submissions included over 1.2 million new apps and nearly 800,000 app updates.
• Apple stopped more than 5.4 million stolen credit cards from being used to make fraudulent purchases.
• Over 680,000 apps employ Apple’s secure payment technologies to sell goods and services.

Source: Apple Newsroom, May 2026

Google Play Safety Statistics

• Google Play runs over 10,000 safety checks on every app it publishes and rechecks apps after they are published.
• Google banned more than 80,000 developer accounts that attempted to publish harmful apps in 2025.
• Google Play Protect scans over 350 billion Android apps daily.
• Enhanced fraud protection expanded to 185 markets covering more than 2.8 billion Android devices and blocked 266 million risky installation attempts in 2025.

Source: Google Security Blog, February 2026

Key finding: Apple rejected over 2 million problematic app submissions in 2025, while Google prevented over 1.75 million policy-violating apps from being published on Google Play. Each platform filtered apps by the million in 2025, so store rules shape which apps reach a phone alongside user demand.

Google Play Service Fees

• 97% of developers distribute their apps and use Google Play at no charge.
• Of the developers subject to a service fee, 99% are eligible for a fee of 15% or less by participating in Google Play programs.
• Under the Play Console service fee rules, in the new fee markets, the fee depends on whether a user’s install is new or existing relative to the regional rollout date.
• In remaining markets, developers enrolled in the 15% service fee tier pay 15% on their first $1 million of revenue each year and 30% above it.

Source: Play Console Help, Service fees, 2026

App Platform Revenue for Apple and Google

• Apple’s Services net sales reached $30,739 million in the quarter ended June 27, 2026.
• That is a 12.09% year-over-year increase.
• Services net sales for the first nine months of fiscal 2026 totaled $91,728 million, up from $80,408 million.
• Google Services revenue increased 15% to $94.5 billion in the quarter ended June 30, 2026, with Google subscriptions, platforms, and devices also up 15%.
• Alphabet reports the sale of apps and in-app purchases within Google Services, alongside fees for consumer subscription products and devices.

Smartphone and Mobile Subscription Statistics

• Smartphone subscriptions reached 7,470 million worldwide in 2025, up from 7,170 million in 2024, according to the Ericsson Mobility Report.
• Ericsson forecasts 8,490 million smartphone subscriptions by 2031, a 2% compound annual growth rate from 2025.
• Data traffic per smartphone rose from 19 GB to 22 GB per month between 2024 and 2025.
• Smartphones carried 143 exabytes of the 146 exabytes of monthly mobile data traffic in 2025.

The takeaway: Ericsson counts 8,840 million mobile subscriptions worldwide in 2025, including 7,470 million smartphone subscriptions. With the smartphone base growing slowly, gains in app spending depend on what existing users buy, which matches the near-flat download growth Sensor Tower measured.

US Smartphone Ownership Statistics

• 98% of US adults own a cellphone of some kind, and 91% own a smartphone, according to Pew Research Center.
• Smartphone ownership stood at 35% in Pew’s first survey of it, conducted in 2011.
• Among adults aged 65 and older, 78 in 100 own a smartphone, against 97 in 100 among those aged 18 to 29.
• 16% of US adults are smartphone-only internet users who own a smartphone but do not subscribe to home broadband.
• Pew surveyed 5,022 US adults from Feb. 5 to June 18, 2025.

Pew’s polls through 2021 were conducted by phone, the 2023 poll by web and mail, and the 2024 and 2025 polls by web, mail and phone. Part of the step between the 2021 and 2023 readings may reflect that change in method rather than new owners.

Conclusion

Store spending of $167 billion grew 10.6% while downloads rose 0.8%, and the latest quarterly data showed revenue up 5.3% on flat downloads. The mobile app industry now grows by selling more to the users it already has, with non-game apps and generative AI doing most of that work. The over $1.4 trillion in commerce flowing through iOS apps also dwarfs what the stores bill directly.

Google plans to expand developer verification globally to all apps on certified Android devices in 2027, and its new Play service fees are rolling out market by market. Those two changes, along with Sensor Tower’s next quarterly index, will show whether store economics shift as quickly as spending has.