TikTok App Downloaded More Times Than Facebook in 2019
We have learned the most frequently downloaded mobile applications of 2019. WhatsApp is the leader of the list, but TikTok was hot on its heels. The mobile market has experienced growth, with video games led by Honor of Kings/Arena of Valor and Pokemon GO.
Last year, the mobile app market was dominated by Facebook. Only TikTok kept up with its pace. According to the information provided by the research company Sensor Tower, in the list of the most popular mobile apps of 2019 the social media hit from the Chinese startup ByteDance gave way only to WhatsApp (according to cnet.com), which has belonged to Mark Zuckerberg's group since 2014. However, due to various controversies, it is unknown whether TikTok will manage to maintain such a high position in the following year.
In 2019, WhatsApp was downloaded by over 850 million people worldwide. The second app in the list, TikTok, was downloaded by over 700 million users, and the results of Facebook and Facebook Messenger oscillate around 700 million. The first five closes with Instagram, also owned by Facebook, its result is less than 450 million. Interestingly, the Indians have been responsible for the highest percentage of downloads for top applications in the past twelve months. In the case of ByteDance' software, currently the most valuable startup in the world, India recorded 45% of first downloads.
Okay, but what's that about TikTok and controversy? At the end of last year the creators of TikTok were accused of violating the privacy and security of users, as well as collecting personal information on Chinese servers. The West did not decide to block the application, but the U.S. Army and Navy have banned it on government phones. The cat was out of the bag.
Huge increases, video games lead the way
Sensor Tower also presented financial results of the mobile market for 2019. It turns out that users spent 83.5 billion dollars on digital goods offered in App Store and Google Play (54.2 billion dollars of which in Apple's store and 29.3 billion dollars on Google's platform). The largest share of this result is accounted for by mobile games, which in 2019 were allocated as much as 61.7 billion dollars, which means an almost 13% increase in spending compared to 2018. Of course, most of the money was generated by games with microtransactions, including Honor of Kings (also known as Arena of Valor), Pokemon GO, Fire Emblem Heroes, Garena Free Fire and Call of Duty Mobile. According to Sensor Tower, the first of the aforementioned games brought the Chinese publisher Tencent an amazing amoount of 1.5 billion dollars last year, while fans of Pokemon GO spent almost 900 million dollars.
Global spending on mobile market in 2019. Source: Sensor Tower
Global spending on mobile gaming market in 2019. Source: Sensor Tower
