17 Intriguing App Usage Statistics That Will Blow You Away in 2023

Have you ever been concerned about the amount of time you spend scrolling on your phone?

Because I sure have. 

Statista reveals that Gen Z unlocks their phones almost 80 times a day. Sounds familiar, right? 

How to avoid checking on your phone when every month Google Play and App Store reveal more than 130,000 new apps, many of which are free? And many people like being early adopters.

We have prepared plenty of fresh app usage statistics to guide you through this captivating topic. This information is quite important when considering billions of app downloads, time spent on them, and revenue levels in the app industry.

Now, before we dive into these exciting stats, here’s a sneak peek of some of the most fascinating ones:

Insightful App Usage Stats (Editor’s Choice):

• Users spend nearly 90% of their smartphone time using apps.
• As of September 2020, Google Play Store and iOS App Store had 108 billion app downloads. 
• The most downloaded non-gaming app in 2020 is TikTok.
• WhatsApp is the most popular app for communicating, counting over 2 billion monthly active users.
• The age group that uses mobile apps the most is 18–24, with 112.6 hours of monthly usage.
• Most consumers have many apps installed on their smartphones, but, for the most part, they use only 45% of them.
• From 2017–2020, the number of mobile app downloads increased by 12.7 billion.
• It’s estimated that by 2024, the number of mobile app users will be over 1.03 billion.

Apps Market Share

We’re starting with some quality info you might not be aware of.

Two giants dominate the app scene, and more apps are now available than ever.

Fasten your seatbelts!

1. In the US, users spend a whopping 90% of their total smartphone time on apps.

(Source: eMarketer)

People reserve nearly 90% of their time on their smartphones for apps. The remaining 10% or so go on web browsers. In the battle of mobile apps vs. mobile websites, statistics show the obvious winner. And they are even more telling when you consider mobile traffic is actually ahead of desktop browsing.

In 2018, clients spent 2h 49min on apps and only 25 minutes on web browsing on average. While in 2020, these numbers are 3h 35min for apps and 25 minutes for browsers. From 2018 to 2020, web browsing time remains more or less the same, while app time continues to grow. The forecast for 2021 and 2022 assumes continuous growth.

These differences are no surprise when you consider the number of available apps. Have you ever wondered how many mobile apps there are?

2. There are 2.87 million apps available on Google Play Store.

(Source: Statista)

According to Statista, as of October 2021, Google Play Store offers 2.87 million apps. But this is not the biggest it has ever been. 

In March 2018, the number of available apps reached 3.6 million. 

And all of this is quite spectacular when we consider that in 2009, Google offered only 16 thousand apps. What an increase in 11 years!

These stats are continuously varying since both Google Play and Apple App Store are constantly improving their offers.

For insights on how many apps are on the App Store iOS, scroll down to the upcoming stat. 

3. There are 1.96 million apps available on the iOS App Store.

(Source: Statista)

Apple App Store offers fewer apps than Google—0.91 million fewer, to be precise. This number makes it the second-largest app store in the world. 

These numbers fluctuate because of the regular updating from both stores. Nevertheless, the number of apps is snowballing in both Google and Apple stores. 

Now it’s very simple to answer how many apps exist today. If we sum up the numbers from both stores, we’ll get nearly 5 million available apps.

All these apps are divided into categories. Check out which app categories are present on App and Google Play Store because, let’s face it, you’re probably using some of them.

4. Apple App Store offers nearly 250,000 gaming apps. 

(Source: 42matters)

Apple App Store formed 27 categories of apps. The top category is games, followed by business and education.

A quick look at the smartphone app statistics reveals that out of all these gaming apps, 228,069 are free, and only 19,665 are paid. These numbers are rapidly changing. 

It’s a little surprising that social networking apps take on the low 15th place in this division. But the reason can be the fact that most people only use a few social media apps. Games, i.e., are released more often than any other category.

Now that we’ve investigated Apple, let’s take a look at Google Play Store. 

5. Google Play Store offers over 336,000 educational apps.

(Source: 42matters) 

Google Play Store has a similar number of app categories as the Apple App store, 49 to be exact. Apps market share differs somewhat between these two. 

Contrary to Apple, Google’s biggest category is education, business in second place, and music & audio in third.

Precisely 321,223 educational apps on Google Play Store are free, while only 15,426 are paid. 

Social apps are also low-ranked, just like at the iOS App Store—they take 16th place for the same reasons. 

Who are these people working so hard on developing so many apps, and how much money do they make?

6. A significant number of 20 million registered iOS developers brought 500 million visitors weekly exclusively to the App Store. 

(Source: TechCrunch)

App revenue statistics show that iOS developers together earned approximately $100 billion. The CEO of Apple, Tim Cook, declared that there were 20 million registered iOS developers. And all this income was acquired through the App Store alone. 

Besides this, Tim Cook stated how Apple’s programming language Swift, is reaching its peak. Developers are writing thousands of apps available in the App Store in Swift—more than 350,000 apps in 2018. 

While on the topic of money, let’s see what else info can app revenue statistics offer.

7. It’s estimated that mobile app revenue for 2023 will amount to 935.2 billion U.S. dollars. 

(Source: Statista)

The total amount of mobile app income for 2018 was 365.2 billion U.S. dollars. This is 28% more than the year before. 

Moreover, it’s estimated that from 2018–2023 the incomes will increase by 570 billion U.S. dollars or more than 156%!

As you can see, apps are becoming more and more popular and completely overtaking web browsing. So, find out more about mobile app usage in the following section. 

App Usage Statistics 2022

People are downloading apps all the time, and the number of downloads is continually increasing.

Many mobile app categories are popular worldwide, but some are more used than others.

These insights will satisfy your curiosity and answer some of the frequently asked questions. 

8. In the first three quarters of 2020, Google Play and App Store recorded around 108 billion downloads.

(Source: Sensor Tower)

As per app download statistics, by September 30. In 2020, Google Play has recorded 81,5 billion apps downloaded for the first time. In the first half of 2020, the number of downloads was 27,3% bigger than in the first half of 2019.

However, in the same time range, Apple App Store has noted around 26,5 billion downloads. Apple also records an increase over the previous year, with 22.8% more downloads.

Speaking of the first half of 2020, Google Play had almost three times more downloads than iOS App Store.

But there’s more to it.

9. The increase in mobile app downloads from 2017 to the 3rd quarter of 2020 amounts to 12,7 billion.

(Source: Statista)

Here’s the proof of the mobile app industry expanding: the numbers had significantly changed since 2017, when there were 94,5 billion app downloads.

So far, in 2020, the total of downloads amounts to 107,2 billion, and the year isn’t over yet! This is a massive increase of more than 13.4% since 2017!

But how many apps are downloaded each day in 2020? The iOS App Store and Google Play recorded 107.2 billion downloads as of September. If we divide this number in order to dig into the daily number of downloads, we’ll get to 0,3 billion downloads per day! 

10. Social, gaming, and communication are the top three app categories for approximately 58% of clients. 

(Source: Simform)

Out of all these downloads, some categories of apps are more popular than others. 

Plenty of app usage statistics reveal that social, gaming, and communication categories are the ones clients use the most. They go on social apps for 131 minutes and play games for 116 minutes a day. 

Some apps aren’t as popular as that, though. Travel, maps, health & wellness, and finance are low on the list, and 6.7% of clients use them. They spend around 128 minutes on these apps combined, which is less than they spend on social apps only. 

But these are just categories, and you probably want to know which particular apps are the most popular ones.

11. WhatsApp is one of the most popular apps for messaging, with an astonishing 2 billion active users per month.

(Source: Statista)

Clients communicate via messaging apps, mostly because of the low costs. The COVID-19 world pandemic has shown the importance of getting in touch with your closest friends and family.

As you can see from the stats, most users choose WhatsApp for this purpose.

Facebook Messenger is in second place, with 1,300 billion active users per month. 

Last but not least on this list is WeChat which counts 1,206 billion monthly active users.

But you may wonder, what is the most downloaded app in the world this year? 

12. TikTok is the number one downloaded non-gaming app in 2021.

(Source: Sensor Tower)

TikTok is a social media platform used for creating short videos. This year is TikTok’s year—it has more than two billion downloads over Google Play and iOS App Store.

So many downloads indicate a high level of app revenue. TikTok’s earnings increased to $456,7 million.

This app outpaced other apps at the very beginning of the year, in the first quarter, with 315+ million downloads. 

Mobile App Usage Demographics 

Okay, we went through some stats about popular apps, but there are other important questions.

Who uses these apps, where in the world, and how many apps do people have on average?

This is just some of the info you will find below.

13. Clients from 18 to 24 years use their mobile apps for 112.6 hours per month.

(Source: Simform)

The most represented group in this division is the 18–24 age group, who use apps on their smartphones for about 3 hours 45 minutes daily. Coincidentally, these are the people that spend the most on the internet.

Mobile app usage by age amounts to around 1 hour 43 minutes daily for the age group 65+.

This is a worldwide division, so it’s also interesting to know where all those people come from. 

14. The number of app downloads in India exceeds 5 billion. 

(Source: AppTweak)

In the first half of 2019, India was the top country per the number of app downloads. It recorded more than 5 billion downloads, both from Apple App Store and Google Play Store. 

The US and Brazil follow India, with more than 3,3 billion and nearly 2 billion app downloads, respectively. These three countries are overtaking the mobile app market size in 2020. 

While 63% of clients download from the App Store in the US, 37% download from Google Play. 

After calculating the number of app downloads for the top 10 countries, the conclusion is that around 74% of app downloads come from Google Play Store. 

Considering billions of downloads, we can only imagine how many apps an average person installs. Luckily, we don’t have to imagine because here’s one other stat:

15. The typical consumer uses 45% of apps installed on their phone 90% of the time.   

(Source: Simform)

Have you maybe wondered how many apps the average person has in 2022? The answer is 40, but they use only 18 of them about 90% of the time. 

This indicates that most of the time, they don’t use 55% of them; they just have them installed. 

When it comes to Millennials, these numbers are even higher. Out of 67 installed mobile apps, they use only around 37% of them. 

16. More than 15% of both men and women use Facebook the most in the US.

(Source: Statista)

Among dozens of apps on persons’ smartphones, app usage stats indicate that you will probably find Facebook on them, considering its global popularity. 

A significant 18% of women choose Facebook as their favorite app, and 15% of men share their opinion. 

Besides Facebook, among the first three most popular apps for both genders is Instagram. According to Statista, 16% of women, and 10% of men, wouldn’t know what to do without this app. 

These stats show the current mobile app state, but here are some expectations for mobile apps’ future. 

17. The studies forecast that the number of mobile app users will go over 1,033 million by 2024.

(Source: Statista)

App usage statistics project an optimistic future for mobile apps in 2024. It’s estimated that mobile apps will generate 5,274 million U.S. dollars in revenue. This is an incredible increase since 2008, when the revenue was 2.65 times lower. 

Moreover, the most significant revenue for 2021 will be achieved by the United States, with an expected $1,269 million. We shall see how they’ll perform in 2022. 

18. The Covid pandemic greatly shifted the types of apps being used in 2020 and 2021.

(Source: Statista)

The restriction of in-person events and activities had a noticeable impact on the types of apps people use. Unsurprisingly the usage of travel-focused and sports apps went down. People didn't have anywhere to go, and a lot of sporting events were canceled.

Just as unsurprising was the increase in usage of media apps, retail apps, and gaming. The apps that saw the biggest increase in use were medical, health, and wellness. The usage of these increased by 60% during the pandemic.

Wrap Up

Wow, this was an enormous amount of information, that’s for sure. Even more stats and facts are available out there, and they’re being updated regularly. After you’ve read so many app usage stats, can you believe that each time you take a few deep breaths, someone somewhere in the world opens an app? 

We can learn from all of this that the app market will continue to grow by the year. The number of available apps is mind-blowing, and it has a promising future. Why is that?

Every time you need to buy something, pay bills, send money, or just scroll through some pictures on Instagram, you’ll most probably use an app.

All over the world, both men and women use the perks of apps and the various features they offer. The world as we know it just wouldn’t be the same without these useful little helpers, and thankfully, there are plenty of app usage statistics to look back to when in doubt.