The most important month for games is behind us, so I crunched the numbers and ranked the winners and losers of this Christmas season.
The thing is, downloads didn't really roll the way I expected even though nearly every single rank in our chart has a different app when compared to November - and that's extremely rare.
Block Blast was the most downloaded game in December. The hyper-casual title has been growing a lot over the last few months, so this wasn't a surprise, and rallied hard in 2024.
According to our App Intelligence, Block Blast made it into 21M new iPhones and Androids in December - the most downloads the title has seen in a single month since its release in 2022.
Dethroned, Subway Surfers was the second most downloaded game in December with 20M estimated downloads. Just a smidge lower than what it hauled in November, so it's really a W for Block Blast and not an L for Subway Surfers, even though it dropped a spot.
Roblox jumped in December into the third spot with 18M downloads, while Hole.io and Free Fire both rose to round out the top five.
You may recall November's TikTok sensation Mini Games, which ranked second overall. Mini Games is still on our chart in December but it dropped to the 9th spot and will likely disappear in January.
Pokemon TCG also dropped a few spots since November while every other app in the bottom five rose.
Together, however, total downloads dropped 4% in December, which I did not expect at all.
December saw a curious split: downloads dropped 2% while revenue sat at $1.3B. ChatGPT and TikTok dominated both charts as the mobile industry enters a new maturity phase.
Wall Street bet $2 billion on Polymarket, and downloads surged 1,172% in December. The prediction market banned in 2022 is now where Wall Street looks for signals.