This Week in Apps - Knocking ChatGPT Down
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. Meta's New AI Worker Just Knocked ChatGPT From #1
Meta has been working on AI for years, but its standalone Meta AI app isn't a household name like ChatGPT, Claude, or Grok. That changed last week with the release of Muse, an AI worker that can keep working after you close the app and return when it needs approval.
Muse spent most of last week near the top of both US charts. On Saturday it reached #1 on the App Store, displacing ChatGPT. Google Play followed on Sunday.
Appfigures Intelligence shows Muse made its way into 1.1M devices through September 18, almost entirely in the US and mostly through the App Store.
The download total is impressive, but Meta controls an enormous ad network, so curiosity isn't necessarily the same as usage. Revenue offers another signal: Grok Bot, xAI's version of Muse, earned $175K in its first 11 days while Muse earned $27K after fees over the same launch window.
It's still too early to judge Muse, but the next few months should tell us whether AI workers can become more popular than the chatbots that came before them.
2. The Most Downloaded Apps in August
ChatGPT was the most downloaded app in the world in August, making its way into an estimated 53M new devices. That's still a massive total, but it was lower than July, which was lower than June, which was lower than May.
TikTok held second place with 40M estimated downloads. WhatsApp and Instagram switched places, and Facebook rounded out the top five. Meta still owns the chart, though growing demand for AI and agents is making that lead look less permanent.
August also brought a new name into the top 10. DramaWave, a short-drama streaming app, doubled its downloads from January to 19M in August and landed in 9th place overall.
For context, Disney+ and Netflix combined for the same number of downloads in August. DramaWave's spike may be temporary, but short drama is here to stay.
Together, the 10 most downloaded apps reached an estimated 299M devices in August, a little more than July and a little less than the pre-summer months.
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3. Vinted's Bet on the US Paid Off
Europe's largest second-hand marketplace, Vinted, made a serious push into the US earlier this year, taking on eBay, Depop, and Poshmark. A whole summer later, the initial hype hasn't faded.
Appfigures Intelligence shows Vinted's US downloads started at 288K in January, jumped to 1.2M in April, and more than doubled to 2.9M by August. As of September 20, the app had reached 12M US downloads in 2026, about 12x its total for all of 2025.
The US accounted for roughly 3% of Vinted's worldwide downloads last year. So far in 2026, that share has risen to 35%, and August alone put Vinted ahead of Depop, eBay, and Poshmark in US downloads.
Vinted saw growing demand for second-hand marketplaces and jumped into the US with both feet. The holiday season will test how much faster that momentum can get.
4. The Highest Earning Apps in August
TikTok held on to its #1 spot, earning an estimated $261M after store fees in August. That's well below its record-breaking days last year, but enough to stay ahead for another month.
ChatGPT was the second-highest earner with $230M in estimated net revenue. Its revenue grew by double-digit millions in both July and August, putting it on track to challenge TikTok's lead before long.
YouTube, CapCut, and Google One rounded out the top five, the same lineup as June and July.
The bigger shift came lower on the chart. Claude rose to 7th with a record $82M in estimated net revenue and took the lead in revenue per download among the major AI chatbots. Claude reached $5.92 per download in August versus ChatGPT's $4.29.
Together, the top 10 highest earners brought in an estimated $1.3B after store fees in August. At that scale, even a small monthly increase is a lot of new money.
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5. Grok Takes X's Revenue to a New High
Splitting Grok into its own app has been a great move for X, and the gap between the two is widening.
According to Appfigures Intelligence, X and Grok earned a combined $57M in worldwide net mobile revenue in August, the most the pair has ever earned. Grok supplied $37.4M of that total, more than double its January revenue, while X contributed $19.6M.
Across the first eight months of 2026, X and Grok generated $359M in combined net mobile revenue, more than twice the same period last year. Grok supplied 62% of it. Giving the AI its own app created a second paid destination that grew much faster.
xAI repeated the move in August with Grok Bot, an app for AI workers powered by Grok.
By September 19, Grok Bot was already on roughly a million devices with nearly $1M in estimated net revenue. As demand for AI workers grows, Grok's more autonomous sibling is positioned to add another stream to xAI's mobile revenue mix.
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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.
