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Global app downloads have plateaued in recent years, especially when comparing between the previous figures provided by data.ai and Sensor Tower. However, global downloads seemed to have recovered in 2025, reaching nearly *** billion unique downloads.

Why the difference? Source methodology explains the gap

The discrepancy arises from considerable differences in the methodology used by the sources to aggregate and generate the data. Sensor Tower reports only unique downloads per user account, excluding app updates, re-downloads, and installations on multiple devices by the same user. In contrast, data.ai includes these additional activities as well as downloads from third-party Android stores and a broader geographic scope, resulting in substantially higher total counts. As a result, Sensor Tower's numbers better reflect new user acquisition, while data.ai's encompass all market activity and total engagement.

Despite stagnating downloads, user spending is growing

While the number of downloads is leveling off, consumer spending on in-app purchases and related revenue has grown in 2025 to *** billion U.S. dollars, up from around *** billion U.S. dollars in 2023. While gaming remains the highest-grossing app category overall, other categories drove the growth. The entertainment, photo & video, productivity, and social networking categories each grew by at least *** billion U.S. dollars in revenue in 2025 compared to the previous year.