Mobile Market Starts to Democratize As Top 1% Publishers See Revenue Shares Shrink

The top 1% of mobile app publishers that put up apps on the Google Play Store as well as the App Store are seeing their dominance recede somewhat. They still receive 91% of the total revenue generated by all apps, but in spite of the fact that this is the case their share of this revenue has started to shrink with all things having been considered and taken into account.

This top 1% received around 79% of the 72 billion total app downloads across both app stores, but with all of that having been said and now out of the way it is important to note that the 21% received by the other 99% is far higher than it was three years ago. This trend was exactly the same when only gaming apps were factored in, although the monopoly was considerably more pronounced for other app categories.

Back in 2019, the top 1% of app publishers received 95% of the total revenue generated by this industry. Over the next two years, this share dropped by 4 points which suggests a higher level of democratization than might have been the case otherwise. The majority of this decline occurred over the previous year, and it will be interesting to see how the rest of the decade plays out because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up making the state of the industry a lot clearer.

The time is ripe for new apps and their developers to make their mark on the industry. Most established apps are trying to come up with new sources of revenue, and this is increasing competition both for them as well as for smaller developers.

Overall, 183,000 publishers split around $4 billion in revenue. While that falls short of the $41 billion generated by the top 1%, it still shows that there is some profit to be had by targeting niche markets. The game is starting to change, and new apps have the ability to get their foot in through the door such as TikTok managed to do.
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