This Week in Apps - The End of Cable TV?

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. Revenue Index (30 Day)

Something Different

Last week, we published a mega report about video streaming apps, something I've covered quite a few times in the newsletter. This week, I chose my favorite insights from the 30+ page report and summarized them for you.

I'd love to hear what you think about the full report, and if you want to see more reports like this on other industries let me know which.

Grab the full report for free →

Insights

1. Video Streaming App Revenue Breaks New Record in 2024

In the last five years, cable TV revenue has been slowly shrinking. And it’s not because people are watching TV less.

According to data from the 2024 Streaming App Industry Report, consumer spending on streaming apps via the App Store and Google Play has quadrupled since 2019.

Cord cutting, switching from traditional cable TV to streaming providers, has resulted in one of the hottest trends in mobile.

How much money are we talking here?

Billions!

According to our App Intelligence, consumers spent a little over $400M per quarter on streaming video apps back in 2019. Short video, led by TikTok, saw $55M in gross revenue, and music streaming apps, which were a lot hotter back then, saw around $200M.

TikTok and the short video category got a massive bump in revenue in 2022 as gross revenue rose more than 10x to $670M in Q2. It continued to rise in 2023 and ended Q1 of 2024 with $911M - the closest the category has ever been to a billion.

Music streaming also rose, but I'll spare you the journey, it nearly tripled. Great, but...

Video streaming apps generated $2.1B in Q1 of 2024. Billion, with a B. The category more than quadrupled in the same period and its apps have been perma-glued to the Top Grossing Chart in the US for long enough that there's no doubt - there's demand and it's not going anywhere.

And while it's the most the category has ever earned, the growth has been consistent with the group earning $1.6B in Q1 of 2023 and that total rising to $1.9B over the year.

What I find most interesting is that the money cable has been reported to lose aligns with the growth we see in apps. So people are not leaving cable for books but are just tossing their set-top boxes for their phones.

Note: I'm totally ignoring revenue streaming apps generated outside of the App Store and Google Play here because it's their main revenue stream.

2. Netflix is No Longer the Most In-Demand Streaming App in the US

When you think of video streaming apps one comes to mind quickly and that’s Netflix, the OG streamer that made streaming by app exciting all the way back in the day, before HBO Go, which eventually became HBO Max and then just Max, even existed and way before Disney rolled out Disney+

And for a long time, Netflix was the most downloaded video streaming app in the world.

Well, not in the US...

We ranked the most downloaded and highest-earning video streaming apps in the 2024 Streaming App Industry Report- both in the world and in the US - and here are the results:

In the US, where the majority of the streaming business is concentrated, Max was the most downloaded app and also the highest-earning app. Our estimates show that Max made its way into 6.4M devices in the US and grossed an impressive $243M in Q1.

Max and Disney+ have been glued to the Top Grossing chart in the US, both in their category and overall, for years, but as of late Max has been the more dominant of the two.

Disney+ was the second highest-earning app in the US in Q1 shy roughly $13M (or 5%). Peacock, Hulu, and Paramount+ round out the top five highest-earners but none of the three crossed the $200M. There's lots of room to grow.

Chasing Max in terms of downloads were Netflix, Paramount+, Peacock, and Amazon Prime Video. A few repeats but generally a different list which shows just how important it is for streamers to turn downloads into paying users so they don't leave the platform. This set is a bit behind.

Globally, things are a bit different.

Netflix was the most downloaded streamer globally. The OG streamer may have weakened in the US but its global presence is still massive, and a good challenge for both Max and Disney+. Our estimates show it was downloaded a little over 39M times from the App Store and Google Play in Q1. Netflix wasn't the highest-earning app globally, however.

Disney+ was the highest-earning streamer globally. The happy mouse grossed $465M in Q1, according to our estimates. Max chased Disney+ and ended Q1 in second place, but was very far behind in terms of numbers with just $295M. And that's gross, which means it's what consumers spent and not what HBO gets to keep.

The total is just a tad higher than US revenue, which shows how amazing Disney's brand reach is.

Crunchyroll, Peacock, and Hulu round out the top five, and if you're thinking to yourself, "What's a niche anime streamer doing so up high???" you're not alone.

All three ended Q1 with fairly similar numbers, $145M, $146M, and $147M - not bad for a niche streamer and 2 US-only streamers.

Demand for Crunchyroll has grown substantially in the last few years. And when I say substantially I mean from just $14M back in Q1 of 2020. I expect to see more niche streamers growing this year.

But the real important question is can this momentum be sustained, and based on these trends the answer is "absolutely". Not only do I expect to see these streamers continue to grow but also niche streamers becoming more popular and related apps (AI-based movie recommenders, etc) jumping on this wave.

3. Peacock and Hulu Figured Out the Formula - Who's Making Moves in 2024

One of the most interesting charts in the 2024 Streaming App Industry Report is an analysis I think all developers and marketers need to do for their competitive niche - a (name).

With the big trend these days being [revenue growing while downloads dropping], it’s important to know which of your competitors are rising and which aren’t.

We used the App Growth Matrix to analyze video streaming apps comparing Q1 of 2023 and 2024 and the results were more interesting than I expected.

The App Growth Matrix (AGM) puts apps into quadrants by their demand and consumer spending. It's a really quick way to see where an entire industry stands, and when used for two periods, makes it very easy to see who's making moves.

In our case, almost every app in this analysis is making moves, so let's start with the most important ones:

Quadrant Crossers

In just a year, both Peacock and Hulu crossed into the High Adoption High Revenue quadrant for the first time. That's an important milestone for both as they learn to optimize turning downloads into revenue. We see that by the growing revenue even though demand is a bit lower. That's a trend we see across the entire industry.

Already Big

Max and Disney+ stayed in their quadrant but changed drastically. Demand for Disney+ is declining faster than all other apps but while downloads dwindle revenue has gone up thanks to price increases and a more optimized conversion process.

Max, on the other hand, flipped the trend. Downloads rose sharply year over year while revenue actually declined. Max is the only app in this analysis that saw revenue dropping, likely due to the lack of new releases and lack of optimization.

Future Stars

Crunchyroll and Prime Video, both in different quadrants but with the same trajectory, are our future stars, with growth in both downloads and revenue.

Amazon's app has been around for a long time but hasn't monetized via subscriptions until recently. Amazon changed that and has been ramping up its spending on exclusives (and is Amazon after all) which is why it's currently in the High Adoption, Low Revenue.

Crunchyroll on the other hand is much less known and is pretty niche, especially here in the US, which explains why it's currently in the Low Adoption, Low Revenue category. I don't expect to see it there for long though.

Overall, this is good news for streamers, both big and small.

4. Ad-Supported Streaming isn't Driving Downloads - But It's Not All Bad

Video streaming apps started with very attractive pricing to gain traction, but within a few short years, all have increased their prices and introduced new and more expensive tiers.

To combat the obvious churn, some streams have introduced a low-cost tier that’s got ads. And by low-cost I mean that its pricing is similar to where things started.

We analyzed the most popular ad-supported tier releases from Netflix and Disney+ to see if they impacted demand for their apps - they should, right?

We used our App Intelligence to analyze the downloads before Disney+ and Netflix rolled out their ad-supported/cheaper tiers and after to see if it tipped the scales in any way.

You'd expect people to flock to both now that they're more cost-efficient, right? Well, that doesn't seem to be the case when looking at the data.

Over the first 17 months of both having their new ad-supported tiers, downloads didn't really increase. The opposite.

Netflix's downloads remained somewhat flat while Disney's continued to drop, as they have been over the last few years.

The new tier did generate some excitement for Netflix, which saw downloads rise by low double-digits for two months after the release. But it didn't last long as download growth dropped into the negative (meaning there were fewer downloads per month), which continued to be the trend for the rest of the months except for two.

Disney+'s journey was worse. The release generated growth for exactly one month and every other month saw downloads dropping double digits - as much as 36%.

Does anyone even care about the ad-supported tier?

Looking at it now, both streamers have roughly half of their user base on the ad-supported tier, which means the new tier wasn't a way to get more new users but rather a way to keep existing users from churning as subscription prices have soared.

Although neither has a free tier, I wouldn't be surprised if that'll come in the very near future as streamers fight for attention without investing as much into new content.

5. This is the Most Discoverable Video Streaming App in the App Store (No, It's Not Disney+)

With streaming wars hotter than ever, getting noticed in the App Store isn't just a nice-to-have but rather a necessity - even for popular streamers who are spending hundreds of millions on paid ads.

Why? Because more than half a billion people use the App Store every week making organic discovery (aka being found through search in the store) a viable channel for getting new downloads for free.

As part of our 2024 Streaming App Industry Report, we ranked all video streaming apps by their Discovery Score, a new score we're working on, and the winner will surprise you.

When it comes to search, different people describe what they're looking for differently. That's why apps and games that succeed with ASO put a lot of effort into finding and targeting the best keywords.

Do video streaming apps spend time on that too? You bet! Well, almost...

To see which app is the most discoverable we can look at how many keywords they rank in, where they rank, and how popular those keywords are. We simplified that by creating a single number that brings all of those components together which we call Discovery Score.

Peacock was the most discoverable streamer in the US in Q1, towering over all other competitors. And it's for a reason, which I'll get to in a minute.

Hulu and Max, the only other apps that try, in our top five, came in second and third. Neither got particularly close to Peacock, but they're at least trying.

App Store Optimization is a long game. While it's possible to see instant gains with the right techniques, growing coverage could take months or even longer. That's why I saw Peacock's domination will continue as long as they don't stop optimizing.

Disney+ and Paramount+, fourth and fifth places, are both in trouble...

Remember how I just said it takes time to build coverage? Disney isn't even trying, and Paramount is barely trying. How do I know? It's pretty obvious by looking at the information right in the App Store. See, App Store Optimization(ASO) revolves around explaining to the search algorithm what the apps are good for because it doesn't know on its own.

The Wrong Way to ASO

For that, apps insert keywords people could be looking for into the app's name and subtitle. Let's compare the winner and loser and you'll see what I mean:

Good: Peacock TV: Stream TV & Movies tells the algorithm the app is about TV, streaming, and movies. So when someone searches for any of those the algorithm can now suggest Peacock. That's good.

Compare that to Disney's, the highest-earning streamer in the world:

Bad: Disney+ tells the algorithm absolutely nothing about the app, only who owns it. People who search for Paramount will find it, but that's pretty much it. That's not good.

Disney+ doubles down on keeping the algorithm confused by not using any keywords in its subtitle either. You could argue that Disney is spending enough on paid ads that organic downloads aren't worth the effort, and won't be right - doing this right will take no more than 30 minutes and Disney+ could dominate organic search.

Seeing Peacock's, Hulu's, Max's and most other streaming investing in organic discovery tells me this area will get very competitive this year much like what happened to the dating category a few years ago.

FYI - I oversimplified the ASO analysis because the nuances don't really matter here.

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.