If you have ever developed a mobile application/game, you know the importance of knowing where the market is going.
Apptica’s recent publication, Mobile games on iOS: winter results and forecasts for spring 2022, is a study that forecasts the volume and type of upcoming mobile games and applications.
Without further ado, let’s look at and interpret the presented data.
Percentage of categories of expected apps: Winter 2021-2022
After analyzing data on applications available for pre-orders, in the autumn of 2021, Apptica predicted that games would triumph among new mobile applications released during the winter.
Of all the applications preparing to launch from December to February on iOS, about 81% were games of various genres.
Health & Fitness apps and Utilities (about 3,4% both), Lifestyle and Social Networking apps (about 2,5% both), Entertainment (about 2%), Photo & Video apps (about 1,5%) as well as Food & Drink applications (about 1%) shared the remaining 19%.
Other application categories like Productivity, Music, Books, Finance, and Education apps made up less than 1% of total production.
Percentage of genres of upcoming games: Winter 2021-2022
Last fall, Apptica forecasted the Simulation games would lead the quantity of all mobile games released this winter (28,3%).
Almost a quarter of games available for pre-order was Role-playing games (24,1%), which the company believed to be second.
These two genres were followed by Puzzle (10,2%), Adventures (7,2%) and Strategy and Sports categories (4,8% each), making up the categories that were expected to be the top-5 in terms of numbers.
Types of mobile apps that were released in winter of 2021-2022
The data collected at the end of the winter tells that the top 10 genres by the number of new apps on iOS include:
- Games (11,3%)
- Lifestyle and Utilities (10% each)
- Business (8,3%)
- Food and Drink (7,3%)
- Shopping (7,2%)
- Entertainment and Education (6,8% each)
- Productivity (6%)
- Health & Fitness (5,8%)
- Social Networking (3,3%)
- Travel ( 3%)
Genres of games that were released in winter of 2021-2022
As forecasted, with more than 12,4 thousand games were released, the Games category became the first in number among all new applications this winter. Nevertheless, the predictions about the rate of upcoming games’ genres have proven not entirely accurate.
The most notable difference between the forecast and reality is the place of Simulation games. Apptica forecasted Simulation to be the most common genre in winter of 2021-2022 with 28,3% but ended up being the second with 12,7%.
Another important note is Roleplaying, which was forecasted to be at second place with 24,1% but covered only 9%, and Sports, defying the odds and being the genre of 4,8% of the games in the said period, not >1%.
Genres of games that were released in winter of 2021-2022: The comparison
The Puzzle category became the most popular genre among mobile game developers.
Apptica forecasted puzzle games to take up only 10,2% but later recorded that this category got 17,1% at the end of the winter. In total, 2,218 mobile puzzle games were released during this winter.
Adventure and Strategy games also had more apps than expected. Instead of 7,2%, adventure games got 11,9%, and strategy games had 7% by the end of the winter, which is 2,2 percent more than the predictions based on pre-orders (4,8%)
Percentage of categories of expected apps: Spring 2022
This spring’s preliminary statistics of expected iOS apps are similar to winter.
According to the forecast, most applications will be games. Apps from the Utilities category are in second place in terms of number.
Apptica noted some changes that may indicate some emerging tendencies: Compared to the number expected before the winter season, the number of new games prepared for release decreased by 1%. In the list of upcoming applications has been replenished with apps from Productivity, Dating, and Medical categories. Unlike winter, the data doesn’t suggest any Food & Drink applications among apps publishers will release this spring.
Winter indicators vs. predictions for spring
Game genres that will most likely become the leaders of this spring will be Simulation, Role-playing, and Puzzle games, as pre-orders analysis suggests.
It is still too early to talk about the exact numbers of upcoming games, though.
Percentage of genres of upcoming games: Spring 2022
Last fall, the Pre-orders section demonstrated that out of all mobile that will be released in winter, about 28.3% were Simulation games.
Although this category still leads, the market may see changes in the percentage of different game genres. Apptica noticed that upcoming Role-playing and Simulation games share first place at the end of February. The percentage of games in both categories now available for pre-order is 26,5 %.
The second place is the Puzzle category’s with about 10.2% share. In third place sits Strategy games: among all mobile titles in the Pre-orders section, games from this category account for 9.2%.
The set of categories in the pre-orders section has slightly changed. Subcategories such as Music, Sports, and Arcade games are not presented in a list of applications preparing to launch in the following three months. This change might indicate that games from these subcategories will enter the mobile market in much smaller quantities compared to the winter.
Key Takeaways
At the beginning of spring, Utilities prevail among all applications released in the next three months. This winter, apps from the Lifestyle category took first place by a small margin: about 11 thousand applications were launched (this winter mobile market has been replenished with about 10,9 thousand apps in the Utilities category).
This winter, the Games category became the first in number among all new iOS applications: more than 12,4 thousand games in total were released. The Puzzle category was the most popular among mobile game developers, with about 2,2 thousand titles being launched.
Puzzle, Role-playing, and Simulation games have ruled the mobile market this winter and will continue to steadily fill the stores this spring.
