In 2023, Indians downloaded a total of 25.96 billion mobile apps on devices running the Android and iOS operating systems, according to data from analytics platform data.ai (formerly App Annie). This figure represents a slight decrease from the 28 billion downloads recorded in 2022. The data encompasses the period from January 1 to December 30, 2023.
Despite the slightly lower download numbers, collective revenues from various app stores in India reached $415 million. However, India’s app store revenues are ranked 25th globally. For example, Google Play Store generated $19 million in revenues last year, followed by Sea with $16 million, dating app Bumble with $11 million, and Tencent with $10 million. It’s important to note that the revenues of apps like Sea, Bumble, and Tencent include the shares paid by developers to app stores.
Analyzing app categories, gaming emerged as the leader in download numbers, with 9.3 billion downloads, followed by social apps with over 2.36 billion downloads, and photo and video apps with 1.86 billion downloads. Other popular categories included finance (1.6 billion), entertainment (1.3 billion), shopping (1.10 billion), business (446 million), education (439 million), productivity tools (995 million), and lifestyle apps (468 million).
Google retained its position as the most popular app in India in 2023, accumulating a total of 449 million downloads, with an addition of 40 million between January 1 and December 23, 2023. Instagram followed with 364 million downloads (30 million additions), Reliance Jio with 266 million downloads (18 million additions), Flipkart with 220 million downloads (28 million additions), WhatsApp with 210 million downloads (20 million additions), and Meta with 207 million downloads (21 million additions).
At the parent company level, Meta, with its suite of apps including Instagram, WhatsApp, and Meta, led with a total of 782 million downloads, adding 70 million downloads in 2023. Google’s parent company, Alphabet, secured the second position with a total of 527 million downloads.
In the e-commerce sector, Meesho, an e-commerce player, competed with Flipkart’s Shopsy, catering to smaller cities and towns. Meesho, with 35.8 million active users by the end of 2023, outpaced Shopsy, which had over 11 million active users.
The battle between e-commerce giants Amazon and Flipkart extended to active user numbers, with Flipkart slightly ahead. By the end of the year, Amazon had over 76 million active users, while Flipkart boasted 82.1 million.
In the over-the-top entertainment segment, Disney+ Hotstar led with over 67 million active users, while Netflix saw its numbers rise to over 16 million. Amazon Prime claimed over 10 million active users, and Zee5 reached 6.7 million.
The data highlights the continued growth and competition in India’s mobile app ecosystem, with various categories vying for user attention and engagement.
