At a Glance
- Global app revenue jumped 21.6% to $155.8 billion in 2025 as subscriptions and in-app purchases offset falling downloads
- App installs fell for the fifth straight year, shrinking 2.7% to 106.9 billion worldwide
- Non-game apps now generate $82.6 billion, surpassing games for the first time
- Why it matters: Developers are proving they can squeeze more money from fewer users, reshaping the entire mobile economy
The app economy defied gravity in 2025. Even as new users dried up for the fifth consecutive year, consumer spending on mobile apps soared to record highs, driven almost entirely by subscriptions and in-app purchases.
App intelligence firm Appfigures reports that global spending across the App Store and Google Play hit $155.8 billion in 2025, up 21.6% from the previous year. The gain came despite total downloads sliding 2.7% to 106.9 billion, down from 109.8 billion in 2024.
Downloads Keep Sliding
The decline in new installs is now a half-decade trend. After pandemic-fueled growth peaked at 135 billion downloads in 2020, the numbers have fallen every year since.
Mobile games took the biggest hit:
- Game downloads dropped 8.6% to 39.4 billion
- Non-game apps eked out a 1.1% rise to 67.4 billion
The pullback in game installs accelerated from the 6.6% decline seen between 2023 and 2024.
Non-Game Apps Top Revenue Charts
For the first time, non-game apps generated more revenue than games. Consumers spent:
- $82.6 billion on non-game apps, up 33.9%
- $72.2 billion on mobile games, up 10%
Games now account for 46% of total in-app spending, down from roughly half in prior years.
The shift reflects developers’ success in pushing subscriptions for everything from fitness trackers to photo editors. While consumers often complain about the proliferation of paywalls, the model has created a more predictable cash flow for creators.
U.S. Numbers Mirror Global Trends
American consumers spent $55.5 billion across all mobile apps in 2025, an 18.1% increase from $47 billion in 2024. Downloads domestically fell 4.2% to 10 billion.
Breaking down U.S. spending:
- Non-game apps: $33.6 billion, up 26.8%
- Games: $21.9 billion, up 6.8%
Non-game app installs totaled 7.1 billion, while games were downloaded 2.9 billion times.
Subscription Economy Spurs Investment
The steady revenue stream has attracted big money to companies that help apps monetize. Over the past year:
- RevenueCat, a subscription management platform, raised a $50 million Series C
- Appcharge, which helps mobile games improve monetization, announced a $58 million Series B in August
- Liftoff Mobile, which markets and monetizes apps, filed for an IPO this week
Olivia Bennett Harris reported these funding rounds signal investor confidence that the subscription model still has room to grow, even as download growth stalls.
Key Takeaways
- Revenue resilience: Developers offset falling downloads by extracting more money per user through subscriptions and in-app purchases
- Genre shift: Non-game apps now drive the majority of consumer spending on mobile for the first time
- Domestic momentum: U.S. spending growth outpaced the global average, rising 18.1% to $55.5 billion
- Investment tailwind: Startups serving the app monetization ecosystem continue to attract nine-figure funding rounds
