Tag: Google Play

Montana passes a bill to ban TikTok within state. Under this bill ByteDance is prohibited from doing business in Montana. Anyone violating this ban will be fined $10,000 per violation per day. Fine, however, is to be paid by ByteDance itself.

Bill also requires mobile platforms App Store and Google Play to limit access to TikTok within state. This might become a precedent in US and will require Apple and Google to provide app availability on per-state basis.

Reference: First US state officially bans TikTok, $10,000 fine per violation

Google has begun previewing the latest changes to Android as part of November’s Google Play System updates, including improvements for Wallet and parental controls. Google is also bringing its updated photo picker to nearly every Android device, including ones that are quite outdate (Kitkat).

Google has now announced that Android’s photo picker UI — the one that debuted with Android 13 is becoming available for almost all Android device. According to the patch notes, phones and tablets as far back as Android 4.4 KitKat, released in 2013, will be able to use Android 13’s photo picker. (Originally, Google had only said that devices on Android 11 and newer would get the new design.)

Sensor Tower published a report on mobile gaming.

The U.S. mobile games market has faced significant challenges during the first half of 2022. Overall U.S. mobile game revenue fell by 9.6 percent Y/Y to $11.4 billion, while downloads declined by 2.5 percent to 2.4 billion. Looking at just 2Q22, revenue decreased by 11.4 percent Y/Y to $5.6 billion, though downloads were largely flat at 1.2 billion.

Sensor Tower

Sensor Tower: Most Mobile Game Genres See Revenue Declines in the U.S. During H1 2022 as Industry Headwinds Bite

Reference: We’re downloading fewer mobile games as lockdowns end and inflation bites

TechCrunch reports device usage statistics based on data.ai article (formerly App Annie).

Statistics also show top downloaded apps. Instagram, Facebook and TikTok top the list.

Read the full report, to get more details on each app category.

data.ai: Mobile Users In Two Regions Now Spend 5.7 Hours A Day In Apps

Reference: Mobile users are now spending 4-5 hours per day in apps

New report from Sensor Tower gives perspective on mobile spendings in 2021.

 The top 100 non-game subscription-based apps saw their revenue grow 41 percent year-over-year from $13 billion to $18.3 billion globally. This was 7 percentage points greater than in 2020, when spending in these apps climbed 34 percent Y/Y from $9.7 billion in 2019.

Sensor Tower

According to Sensor Tower almost a thousand developers earned $1M for the first time in 2021. Of those 581 are on App Store and 325 on Google Play.

Report also contains more information on app category distribution.

Sensor Tower: Nearly 1,000 App Publishers Earned $1 Million for the First Time in 2021

Reference: New data shows how many App Store devs earned $1M for the first time in 2021

Report by Sensor Tower provides info on app spendings in 2021.

App Store still leads in app spending having $85.1B vs $47.9B in Google Play.

Google decided to follow South Korean ruling allowing third-party in-app purchase methods in mobile apps.

Change is relevant to apps in South Korea only.

The South Korean government recently passed a law regarding app stores and billing systems for users in South Korea. We respect the decision of the National Assembly, and we are sharing some changes to respond to this new law, including giving developers that sell in-app digital goods and services the option to add an alternative in-app billing system alongside Google Play’s billing system for their users in South Korea. These changes will allow us to comply with the law, continue to invest in Android and Google Play, and provide the seamless, safe and trusted user experience billions of people expect from Google Play.

Google Blog

Google will charge fee on transactions made via alternate systems. Fee is smaller than regular Google Pay billing, but still significant.

Service fees for distributing apps via Android and Google Play will continue to be based on digital sales on the platform. We recognize, however, that developers will incur costs to support their billing system, so when a user selects alternative billing, we will reduce the developer’s service fee by 4%. For example, for the vast majority of developers who pay 15% for transactions through Google Play's billing system, their service fee for transactions through the alternate billing system would be 11%. As another example, certain categories of apps participating in our Media Experience Program, such as an eBooks provider, will pay a 10% service fee for transactions made via Google Play’s billing system, but only 6% for transactions on an alternative system.

Google Blog

Google has announced it will take a smaller cut from developers’ Play Store subscription fees starting next year. Developers will pay 15% of their cut to Google, down from the 30% currently demanded in certain situations. The changes come into effect from January 1, 2022.

Google announced the “Private Compute Core” at I/O in May as an effective rebrand of “Device Personalization Services,” which is also now called “Android System Intelligence.”

The Private Compute Core is where features like Live Caption, Now Playing, and Smart Reply operate in a network-isolated manner from the rest of Android and apps.