A new report published by App Annie today claims that revenue from games was responsible for 90% of Google Play revenue in the first quarter of 2014. The report also explained that Google Play’s quarterly app revenue more than doubled …
A new report published by App Annie today claims that revenue from games was responsible for 90% of Google Play revenue in the first quarter of 2014. The report also explained that Google Play’s quarterly app revenue more than doubled since Q1 2013, and that revenue is surpassing download growth, meaning that people are spending more money in their favorite games.
Freemium revenue dominates across the world. To give you an idea how much freemium games account for revenue, let’s look at Brazil. In Brazil, paid games (with and without in-app purchases) make up a whopping 10% of revenue. The other 90%? Freemium. While worldwide download numbers and revenue continue to rise, paid games continue to be overshadowed by the freemium market.
Almost half of the total downloads in the Google Play store in May 2014 were freemium apps. Those freemium downloads made up 98% of the month’s revenue.
The Google Play store continues to expand with each quarter. The number of apps hosted in the store grew by 60% between July 2013 and June 2014. The App Annie report estimates that there are “well over” one million apps available on the Google Play store.
The App Annie report comes during the week of Google I/O 2014, Google’s annual developer’s conference.
After reading the report, I’m wondering how long this rocketing growth will last. How long will the mobile market be able to withstand revenue surpassing download growth? After awhile, will people be only paying for a handful of games from a handful of publishers? Or will the mobile game industry continue to churn out disposable games, that are just enough to tide people over until the next big game crawls up into the “Top” charts?
