Call of Duty: Mobile

Sensor Tower: Mobile players spent $61.7 billion on games in 2019

Android and iOS mobile players spent about $61.7 billion on games in 2019, according to market analyst Sensor Tower.

That is up 12.8% from 2018 and its $54.7 billion total, a healthy growth for gaming. That $61.7 billion in 2019 represented 74% of mobile spending for the year. With mobile representing the largest sector of the gaming industry, this is good news for gaming in general.

In total, games made up 68% of revenue for iOS, while making up 84% for Android.

Global consumer spending in mobile games for 2019.

Android and iOS were also downloading a lot of games in 2019. First-time mobile game installs reached 42.1 billion, up 9.9% from 2018.

Google Play accounted for 78% percent of all game downloads, with the battle royale shooter Garena Free Fire being the most popular title for the platform. On iOS, Call of Duty Mobile was the most popular game in terms of revenue.

Call of Duty mobile launched in October and got off to a fast start, earning 180 million downloads across both stores in Q4 2019. That is the best quarter for a mobile game since Pokémon Go‘s launch in Q3 2016. Sensor Tower also notes that the industry is seeing healthy competition. Among all publishers, none of them have more three games among the top 20 titles by overall downloads ind Q4.

Mike Minotti

Mike Minotti has been with GamesBeat since 2012, starting as an intern. Based near Youngstown, Ohio, he now manages GamesBeat's editorial team. He's also a prolific podcaster, appearing on multiple shows covering the gaming industry.