Niantic's augmented reality game Pokémon GO has just recorded its best year ever in terms of in-game player spending.
According to Sensor Tower's Store Intelligence estimates, the mobile app generated around $894 million in gross player spending in 2019. Before this, the best period for GO was the year of its launch in 2016, when it banked $832 million.
This growth is linked to ongoing in-game updates. Last year, in particular, saw the introduction of Team Rocket, which gave the game its "fourth and fifth" best months when it made $116 million in August and $126 million the following month. The three most profitable months for the game date back to 2016 (from July through to September).
The United States is where GO caught most of its revenue in 2019, collecting $335 million (38 percent of all user spending) and Japan was second place, spending $286 million (32 percent) on the game. Germany was in third, making up six percent of player spending ($54 million). In terms of downloads, the US was in the top spot with 10 million installs last year, followed by Brazil with five million, and India in third place with three million installs. All up, there were more than 55 million installs in 2019.
Google Play users spent more on the game (about $482 million) and the App Store generated around $412 million. There were also more downloads on Android devices (38 million installs) compared to the App Stores 17 million downloads. More than $3.1 billion has been spent on GO to date and the average revenue per download is $5.70.
Compared to other mobile games, the amount of money Niantic's game made in 2019 makes it the fifth top earner worldwide, right behind Candy Crush Saga. The top-grossing game goes to Honor of Kings by Chinese tech giant Tencent, which generated "close to" $1.5 billion. GO also remains the king of location-based games and the only title within this category that's been able to increase its revenue from its launch year.
What are you expecting from Pokémon GO in 2020? Tell us below.
[source sensortower.com]
Comments (12)
1st and wow go pokemon go
Will be enough for better Pokémon animations ? I think not
RIP Pokemon mainline.
Meowth used Payday!
"Is this game still a thing?"
No, clearly it's dead.
Why? Just... why???? Really don't understand why people keep spending so much money on this. But whatever floats their boat.
@Yosher It's not likely much per person. The game has been downloaded millions upon millions of times. A couple dollars here and there, every now and then, adds up.
It's an amazing game. Congrats Nintendo, make that money.
@mesome713 I don’t think Nintendo have a huge amount to do with the title or make a huge amount of money directly from it, but it’s always been good advertising for a series so strongly affiliated with the company.
Pretty incredible really. I've recently gone back to the game after all the updates but still haven't spent a penny on it and don't plan to. It's a fun enough little distraction when you're out and about though.
@Starkiller987 Game Freak is who you want Niantic has done a good job with thier fist Pokemon title.Gamefreak got greedy
"I'll sell the formula and make myself zillions of bucks. That's enough money to buy my own country, or my own planet even." -James Team Rocket
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