This Week in Apps - AI Surge
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 (vs. 30 days ago)
Insights
1. ChatGPT Enters a Brand New Club of Apps
ChatGPT is one of the fastest-growing apps on mobile right now. Since January, revenue has nearly tripled, ending August with $31M in net revenue from the App Store and Google Play, according to our App Intelligence. And that's what OpenAI gets to keep after Apple and Google take their fees.
In the last month, ChatGPT entered a new club: apps earning a million a day.
Since the middle of August, we estimate that ChatGPT saw at least $1M of net revenue every single day (except for 3).
While $1M+ days aren't completely new to ChatGPT, it only experienced a few of those in July before dipping below for a few weeks. It didn't have those before.
ChatGPT's growth was pretty stellar since it was released last May, but things kicked into high gear this April with the release of GPT-4o, which pushed revenue up 40% to $20M in a single month. Growth slowed down a bit, but continued and within just four months, rose another 50%.
The App Store is where most of ChatGPT's revenue is coming from. In August, the App Store was responsible for $26M, or 81% of the total haul, according to our estimates. And while the US is ChatGPT's most dominant revenue source, six other countries add more than $1M to ChatGPT's MRR and two of those grew double-digit percent in August.
ChatGPT's growth is part of a bigger trend I see across the store - AI app revenue is growing fast and isn't limited to just popular names.
In fact, I used Explorer to find all apps that have "AI" in their name and make between $1,000 and $50,000 per month. Guess how many it returned - 952! Their average MRR is $11K, according to our App intelligence.
ChatGPT has ushered in a new era for apps. If you're looking for your next project, the question isn't "Should I develop an AI app?", that's a resounding yes, but rather "What kind of AI app should I make?". For that you should do some research - there are so many easy opportunities.
2. Closing in on a $1B Top 10 - The Highest Earning Apps in the World in August
When we look at the top-earning apps (excluding mobile games), the rankings can often feel repetitive. These app giants rake in so much revenue, according to our App Intelligence, they’ve essentially cemented their place at the top.
That’s pretty much what we’re seeing this month. But like we pointed out for July, there’s something interesting happening in the top 10. Combined, the top apps earned around $880M. In August, they came even closer to hitting $1B. So, how close? Let’s dive in.
No surprise here—TikTok was once again the world’s highest-earning app in August, pulling in $240M in net revenue for ByteDance. That’s up $19M from July, a solid 9% month-over-month jump.
YouTube stayed steady in second place, adding another $7M in August. Disney+, Tinder, and Max rounded out the top five, with revenues barely changing from July.
Last month, Peacock outpaced Hulu thanks to the Olympics, snagging the #9 spot. In August, it climbed to #8, adding an extra $4M.
And look who’s back at #10—Duolingo, returning to the top 10 for the first time since April, pushing Tencent Video out.
So, how close did we get to $1B? The top 10 brought in about $917M in August. At this rate, we’re expecting to break the $1B mark by the end of the year.
3. The Slipping and Sliding Slows - The Most Downloaded Apps in the World in August
We’ve gotten used to seeing app downloads slowly decline, so August’s estimates came as a surprise. But before we dive into the numbers, let’s check out the rankings.
The top five download leaders didn’t change from July, but there’s something interesting happening when you look closer at the actual install numbers.
Instagram held onto the #1 spot and even grew by 3M downloads over July, bucking the prevailing downward trend. Meanwhile, #2 TikTok saw a drop of 2M downloads compared to the previous month.
WhatsApp, ranked #4, saw a small turnaround, adding 4M downloads from July. On the other hand, Facebook, sitting at #3, stayed flat with 43M downloads, while #5 Temu held steady rank-wise but dropped by 2M from July’s 37M total.
Looking at the rest of the list, there were a few shifts — Threads moved up to #6, and ChatGPT entered the top 10 at #9 as its model keeps evolving.
Altogether, the top 10 apps racked up 353M downloads in August, 1M more than July. Now, this isn’t a sign that the overall slump is over, but the slight dip in June and July, followed by a bit of growth in August, is a positive sign.
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4. Disney+ Revenue Reversed the Trend
Disney has been in the news a lot recently and mostly for their mega hits and massive controversies. What most don't talk about is the incredible speed revenue from its streaming service, Disney+, has been growing this summer.
If you've been following Disney+ for a while, you know that this year has been a weird year for revenue. After a big boost at the end of last year, revenue has not grown much for most of the year, and even dropped a bit for a few months prior to the summer.
Still, revenue was significantly higher than 2023. 31% higher, according to our App intelligence.
But then July happened.
This July, revenue rose 13% month over month resulting in $122M in net revenue - what Disney gets to keep after Apple's and Google's fees - globally, according to our estimates. August rose a teeny tiny bit to $124M. Not a lot, but it also didn't fall, so overall, it's a win.
Fun fact: that translates to a little over $166K per hour.
Disney+ doesn't have a history of revenue exploding during the summer, which might be a surprise to some but shouldn't. Streaming revenue is directly correlated to new releases. The bigger the better.
Although the US is the biggest earner for Disney+, the streamer earned $1M+ from 16 other countries in August. Together, those and the US were responsible for 90% of all of the revenue Disney+ generated in August.
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes started streaming recently, as did Inside Out 2, and a new installment in the Alien series is up next. Let's see where these take revenue as we head into the holidays, when revenue traditionally increases.
5. Snapchat+ Wasn't a Mistake After All...
When Snapchat+ rolled out I called it a way to pay to beta test features and thought it was a mistake and that it wouldn't grow.
Our App Intelligence show that last month, the total gross revenue generated by Snapchat+ crossed half a billion. That's a lot of beta testers.
So, I was wrong - kind of. Snapchat+ had a strong opening months but revenue dipped right after. Like I expected. But that's where things changed - Snap started expanding plus and it didn't take too long for it to grow the features people actually cared about.
Today, Snapchat+ is still a bundle of mostly vanity features, but there are a few features that I think make the subscription attractive to many users - story boost and priority replies. Social media has become as much about the views as it is about the followers, and both of these features go beyond the vanity.
But back to revenue. Our App Intelligence shows that since release, Snapchat+ has earned Snap $581M. We estimate that in August, users spent more than $49M in the app, and that revenue is growing roughly 9% month over month, which means Snapchat will hit a billion by next March.
Like most social media apps, the US is Snapchat's biggest earner, with the UK, France, Saudi Arabia, and Canada rounding out the top 5. Which means there's more room for growth.
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.
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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.
