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Apple Overpowers Android on Mobile Gaming for 84% of Revenue

May 10, 2012

Apple is killing Android on the mobile gaming field, dominating 84 percent of the revenue spent on mobile games, according to a recently released study from Newzoo.

Surveying 17,000 individuals, the company compiled revenue data from the top 200 games for both iOS and Android. The majority of actual revenue was spent on the iOS platform, a trend Newzoo credits with Apple’s ease of purchase.

“When analyzing Apple’s successful monetization, there is one dominant factor outside of differences in audience demographics and preferences: Apple requires users to connect their credit card information directly to their account, thus creating a seamless purchase experience,” said Newzoo’s CEO Peter Warman in a statement. “I can hardly imagine any other company in the world that would be able to get away with this, including Google and Microsoft. Facebook can come a long way, but Amazon clearly has the best chance and is proving this as we speak.”
However, Android was able to make considerable headway in the gaming community with the release of the Kindle Fire.

“The Kindle Fire, being the runner-up tablet in the US only 3 months after launch, has single-handedly doubled Android’s share of revenues in the US compared to European countries,” Warman said. “It will do the same in the UK soon after launch, but the rest of Europe might be a different story. Now that we have monthly revenue insight into game revenues across both Apple’s App Stores as well as Google PlayStore we will soon be able to report on this. And after that, there is Mac versus PC apps, and then finally… the battle for the TV. Exciting times.”
The study also revealed sizable growth in the gaming market, particularly when it comes to payed play. In the US, mobile gaming grew from 75 million to 101 million across all platforms, including 69 percent on smartphones and 21 percent on tablets.

Paying players are also increasing as well. Newzoo predicted that mobile gaming will experience a double digit revenue year for 2012. Paying players grew 35 percent to 37 million players. On average, iOS players spend five times more money than on the Android platform, likely as a result of the devices easy ability to pay, as Warman pointed out. Apple requires you to enter credit information after signing up, so users can pay using a simple password. The company has actually needed to make the system more secure through the addition of password checkpoints to protect parents from children spending the household budget on game purchases through in-apps.

And its those in-app purchases that make the gaming companies livelihoods. Nearly 91 percent of gaming revenue spent on Android and iOS platforms comes from money spent inside the game through an in-app purchase.

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Filed Under: Global, Mobile, Top Stories

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