According to a recent report by app intelligence provider data.ai’s annual “State of Mobile” report,consumer spending on apps saw a modest 3% increase year-over-year in 2023 to reach $171 billion across the App Store, Google Play, and third-party Android app stores in China.
According to the report, consumer spending on non-game apps grew 11% year-over-year in 2023 to reach $64 billion. Social apps and the creator economy drove this growth with TikTok leading the way.
The mobile app economy has reportedly grown to become a half-a-trillion-dollar market, with approximately $1.5 billion being spent every day in 2023 on app store purchases and mobile advertising.
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After declining 2% YoY in 2022, global consumer spending bounced back in 2023 up 3%. Consumers are shifting their spending habits. Popularized by TikTok, as they are opting to spend directly in the app via ‘tips’ to their favorite content creators, opening the door for subscriptions and lAPs.
Also, reports reveal that consumers are now embracing mobile apps for their financial needs from Banking to Payment. Mobile app adoption across top subgenres like Mobile Banking and Digital Wallets and payment has continued to climb as consumers continue to turn to their mobile devices more.
Time spent on Social Apps grew in 2023, as time spent on social apps on Android phones showed no signs of slowing, climbing 9% in 2023 to more than 2.3 trillion hours.
Consumer spending growth also remained strong at 13% year-over-year to nearly $9 billion in 2023. Top social platforms are continuing to unlock monetization strategies outside of advertising, with TikTok, the best add monetizer in the history of the app store.
TikTok Monetization is unparalleled as the app now earns more than $1 per user in the United States, up from just 67 cents per user in 2022.
Some of the largest social media platforms in the US also showed some promise in terms of monetizing through in-app purchases. Snapchat’s consumption increased 5X on the back of its Snapchat subscription and Instagram also saw rapid growth.
Here is an overview of the 2023 Mobile App Landscape
Appstore Spend
$171 million was spent on Appstore, with $325,000 spent per minute in 2023, representing a +3% Year-on-Year (YoY) growth.
Daily Time Spent Per User
5 hours were spent per user daily on, which is 1/3 of daily working hours. This represented a 6% year-on-year (YoY) growth.
Mobile Ad Spend
$362 billion was spent on mobile ads which was reported to be larger than the total economies of countries which include Finland and New Zealand.
Total Hours Spent
A total of 5.1 trillion was spent on apps, marking 14 billion hours collectively per day in 2023. This represented a 6% year-on-year (YoY) growth.
It is worth noting that Generative Al is the breakout genre of 2023. Generative Al, data.ai’s latest addition to its App IQ taxonomy, emerged as one of the fastest-growing genres of 2023.
Al Chatbot apps took off in the later part of the year with the launches of ChatGPT and Character Al and adoption has remained strong since Consumer spending also continued to climb throughout 2023 after huge growth earlier in the year.
The Al Enthusiasm Hit Mobile in 2023, and with many more Apps than just ChatGPT. Thousands of apps flocked to the iOS App Store and Google Play store with ai-related solutions.
For example, 2,500 apps launched in 2023 with “chatbot” in their description, nearly double the apps launched in the previous four years combined.