This Week in Apps #17 - TikTok's Replacement, Hamilton, Trump, and more

This Week in Apps is a short, no-fluff, round-up of interesting things that happened in the mobile industry. Here are our top highlights.

U.S. Mobile Download Index: App Store 86.38, Google Play 82.02

Disney+ knows how to do "it" right. Last Friday, Disney+ added Hamilton, the musical you undoubtedly heard about, to its roster. As you can imagine, it brought new users to the app.

More than 300,000 new users downloaded the app between Friday and Sunday across the App Store and Google Play.

Also, Disney+ has this tiny quirk.

There's been a lot of movement in the food delivery business over the last few weeks. First, #3 Grubhub was acquired, and now #2 Uber Eats has acquired #4 Postmates. But can the "reinforced" Uber Eats take on #1 DoorDash? If we strictly look at downloads, maybe. Expect more VC-sponsored burritos.

TikTok loyalists are a powerful group, and they really don't like Donald Trump. They claimed responsibility for low attendance to his rally in Tulsa last month, and this week they're responsible for hurting Trump's mobile app.

This week, more than 250,000 negative ratings were left on both the App Store and Google Play, pushing the app's average rating to a single star on both platforms. However, the "fake" downloads also propelled the app into the #4 position in the U.S. top chart. So, not all bad.

Talking about TikTok... Last week I asked who's going to fill TikTok's gap. A question on the minds of analysts and teenagers alike. This week we saw a new contender emerge to claim some fame.

Byte app, from the original maker of Vine (and the less known 🍑), is now the #1 free app in the U.S. TikTok loyalists didn't love that and are leaving negative ratings. See a pattern here?

Apps in the travel category, which suffered the most from the lockdown, saw a glimmer of hope as states reopened. But as cases have been rising sharply since that started, downloads have declined again to lockdown levels, as indicated by the Mobile Download Index.

That's it for this week. Get these insights by email by subscribing to the newsletter.