🗞 Fun and games

Saving on gas, Diablo rolls out to mobile, a look at Pokémon Go's revenue, and the most downloaded apps and games. U.S. Revenue Index (30 Days) App Store 409.03 +8.6% Google Play 327.46 +6.9% Happy Friday, {NAME} 👋 This week I've looked at the most downloaded apps and games, and spoiler alert, downloads are the highest they've been this year! I've also looked at the launch of Diablo Immortal and revenue of Pokémon Go, which hit an all-time high. Ariel. [View in browser]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Insights 1. High Gas Prices Lead to... Lots of Downloads Everyone is talking about the high gas prices here in the US, and with good reason. Prices have gone up so much they're now around $5 across much of the country. I remember when it was a dollar... Demand for two apps that help with this has been rising this week. Those two apps include GasBuddy, a crowdsourced service where drivers report gas prices in different stations so you can find the cheapest option, and Upside, a service that offers cash back on gas. Although they're different, the two end up doing the same thing - saving you money on gas, and that's what people want these days. How many people? According to our estimates, combined downloads of the pair rose more than 3x in April, hitting an average of nearly 200 thousand downloads a day over the last few days. They averaged just 60 thousand in early April, in case you're comparing. And while we're at it, the daily average in January was about half of that. Things are weird right now in many ways, which means there are, and will be, more opportunities for many apps. The key is that you have to be ready for when the opportunity comes. Is your app ready? --------------------------------------------------------------- 2. Diablo Immortal Hits the App Store, and Users Feel the Squeeze If you're a gamer or an old timer, the name Diablo should be familiar to you. I'm at least one of those two (I'll let you guess which one), so I've been waiting patiently for Blizzard to release Diablo for quite a while. Now that the game's been released and has a few days in the stores, it's time to see how it's doing. For that, we'll dip into our revenue estimates. In its first week on the air, Diablo Immortal, which was developed for mobile first and wasn't supposed to be on PC (but is now in beta), has earned a whopping $6.5 million in net revenue, according to our estimates. That's what Blizzard gets to keep after giving Apple and Google their fee. Most of the revenue was generated in the US, which contributed roughly 53% of the total. Japan, South Korea, Germany, and the UK were the top five countries by revenue. Store wise, Google Play added about 30% of the total, with the App Store being responsible for the larger portion. Not a real surprise here. Here's the thing. Many gamers who played Diablo Immortal complained about the game's constant need for microtransactions and how things get very expensive and progress requires a big wallet. That seems like something more free-to-play games with big brand names are trying to do these days. I can't fault them. Monetizing is hard, advertising has become more expensive thanks to ATT, and the competition is already ahead in terms of optimization. I expect the trend to go in that direction for more games, especially if it works, which I'd say is the case here. I'm Hiring! [Mobile Insights Analyst]( [Back End Developer]( [React Developer]( [More positions]( --------------------------------------------------------------- 3. Pokémon Go Hits Highest Day of Revenue Pokémon Go just had its annual Pokémon Go Fest last week, a festival for players. It started as an in-person event, but during lockdowns, it turned into a virtual event. It's a hybrid event this year, mixing virtual and IRL. Every year, the event causes downloads to spike. But this year, it did something else. Last week, Pokémon Go recorded the most revenue in a single day for two days in a row. Can you guess which days those were? Yup, Fest days. Our estimates show that over the weekend, Pokémon Go earned more than $14 million in net revenue from the App Store and Google Play. It averaged about a million and a half for most of May, according to our estimates. A 4x difference in terms of daily revenue. The US led the way, bringing in the majority of revenue, roughly 75% of it all, followed by Japan and Germany. And unsurprisingly, the App Store was responsible for about 82% of the revenue. Google still contributed millions. If you thought virtual is dead now that more things are re-opening, think again. The new reality is hybrid, or "mixed" if you're into rumors, and this new daily record from Poékmon Go is a good reminder of that. --------------------------------------------------------------- 4. Instagram is Getting Close! The Most Downloaded Apps This week I crunched the numbers and ranked the most downloaded apps in the world in May. Let's have a look at the list, which feels a lot like April's but with higher numbers. TikTok was, again, the most downloaded app in the world, making its way into 54 million new iOS and Android devices worldwide while still being banned in India. Fun fact: TikTok has been the most downloaded app in the world every month so far in 2022. But! Unlike in previous months, second place Instagram almost matched its downloads. When you round to the nearest million, which is what we do in our graphics, you end up with 54 million downloads for it as well. That's the first time Instagram got so close to TikTok this year, and a possible sign that it could eventually regain the lead. Maybe. We'll see. Meta's trio, Telegram, Snapchat, Messenger, and WhatsApp Business make up much of the list, oh and let's not forget constant CapCut. This month there's a new entrant to this list: fast fashion shopping app SHEIN. SHEIN has seen demand grow a lot in 2022, something I looked at in [episode #110](. I have a feeling we'll see more of it this summer. Together, the top 10 most downloaded apps in the world made their way into 353 million new devices in May, according to our estimates. That's a bunch more than April if you're comparing. Actually, the most this year. --------------------------------------------------------------- 5. Let's Get Hyper Casual! The Most Downloaded Games This week I (also) crunched the numbers and ranked the most downloaded games in the world in May. Get ready to get (hyper) casual! Subway Surfers was the most downloaded game in the world in May. The classic title added 41 million new users to its user pool in May, the game's biggest month so far this year. It's worth noting that Subway Surfers has been the most downloaded game every month this year. Nice! And while Subway Surfers is a great oldie, the rest of our list is full of new(ish) hyper-casuals... Although advertisers continue to complain about Apple's App Tracking Transparency, it seems that with summer coming, a hit on ROI isn't the end of the world. Which is expected. Also on this list is a game that launched at the end of May and managed to score quite a few downloads, enough to get into our list, and that's Apex Legends, which I looked at last week. In May, Apex Legends added 16 million new downloads, leading me to believe we'll be seeing it again in June. Probably at a higher rank. Together, the top 10 most downloaded mobile games were downloaded 198 million times in May, according to our estimates. Much like apps, May has also been the strongest month for games so far this year. --------------------------------------------------------------- In Case You Missed It Don't Optimize for the Wrong Keyword The keyword that makes sense intuitively isn't always the more popular keyword. That's why you need data! [Give it a read →]( Get Rewards Chances are you have a friend (or three) who'd enjoy the newsletter as much as you do. Tell them about it and win rewards. You've got 0 referrals so far. Only 5 more referrals to get a Pack of Stickers. Nice! Visit your referral hub for more details + to see your personal referral link. [Referral Hub →]( --------------------------------------------------------------- That's all I have for you for this week. See you next week, and don't forget to share! © 2022 Appfigures Inc. 133 Chrystie St. New York, NY 10002 Update your email preferences [here](