Where Did Facebook Go? The Most Downloaded Apps in the World

Ariel Ariel
4/14/23

This is a single insight from This Week in Apps - Millions of Downloads. Check out the full article for more insights.


March is behind us so I crunched the numbers and ranked the most downloaded apps in the world. I know many of you have been waiting for me to say that for the last few months!

Instagram and TikTok continue to top the list, but there are a few interesting trends I noticed, and some are related. Let's jump right in.

Instagram was the most downloaded app in the world in March, making its way into 50M more iOS and Android devices, according to our estimates. It beat rival TikTok by a handful of downloads, but the ranks could easily flip in April.

CapCut, TikTok's complimentary video editor, is the one app I've been keeping an eye on for a while, and we're finally seeing its expansion. We'll get back it in a moment.

Facebook and WhatsApp in 3rd and 4th complete the Meta Trio. Once interesting insight here is that if you look at the list on the App Store you won't find Facebook anywhere in the top 10. This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who's following this series...

Facebook's downloads and rank started dropping towards the end of 2022 and even disappeared once or twice. It came back before, but looking at this trend, I think it may not this time.

Replacing Facebook, on the App Store, is Google, which owns 5 of the top 10 most downloaded apps in the App Store.

And finally, rounding out the top 5, is CapCut. I only expect to see it rising in rank in the future.

Spotify and SHEIN squeezed into the list in March as well. The two have appeared on the list before, but not often.

You may be surprised Temu hasn't made the list. Keep in mind, this list looks at global downloads, and Temu isn't focused on any market other than the US. So it's getting quite a few downloads -- 9M in March from both platforms -- it isn't enough to make it into the global list.

Together, the top 10 most downloaded apps in the world across the App Store and Google Play saw 308M downloads, according to our estimates. That's a tad shy of last March, but not enough to cause concern considering the top results are almost identical.

App Intelligence for Everyone!

The insights in this report come right out of our App Intelligence platform, which offers access to download and revenue estimates, installed SDKs, and more! Learn more about the tools or schedule a demo with our team to get started.

Are you a Journalist? You can get access to our app and market intelligence for free through the Appfigures for Journalists program. Contact us for more details.

All figures included in this report are estimated. Unless specified otherwise, estimated revenue is always net, meaning it's the amount the developer earned after Apple and Google took their fee.


Related Resources

Did Netflix Find a New Downloads Growth Hack?
Insights
Did Netflix Find a New Downloads Growth Hack?

Netflix pulled a Peacock move last week by getting into live sports - specifically, boxing, a sport not streamed by many...

TikTokers Screaming At Chickens Sent An Unlikely Game to #1 - The Most Downloaded Games in the World
Insights
TikTokers Screaming At Chickens Sent An Unlikely Game to #1 - The Most Downloaded Games in the World

How are the top mobile games in terms of scooping up new players doing? It's time to check out the latest monthly top 10...