Which companies own the most popular apps in the world?
Over the past week, Facebook changing its name to Meta has been the talk of the town. The move to rebrand itself is seen to distance itself from a social media business, one which has been embroiled in a crisis, into a creator of a new digital world known as the “metaverse”.
While I will be looking to blog more about the metaverse, this article looks to cover some of the most downloaded apps in 3Q21 and why Facebook remains the most dominant company in the social media space.
However, might there be other interesting insights that we can take away from the recent apps download trend? We take a look at some of the major app trends provided by data from Sensor Tower.
Most downloaded app in 3Q21
Tik Tok, owned by Bytedance, remains the most downloaded app in 3Q21, marking the fifth quarter in a row in which it held the top spot.
However, the next four downloaded apps of the quarter belong to Facebook (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger).
The popularity and mass adoption of the four Facebook-owned apps is evident not just in the latest quarter but these 4 apps that belonged to Facebook have all been downloaded more than 3bn times each between 1Q14 to 3Q21.
In total, the number of times that these 4 apps have been downloaded since 2014 amounts to a massive 20.1bn times.
The only other app that has crossed the 3bn total downloads is Tik Tok. Snap, currently in 6th place, will likely only surpass the 3bn download mark in 2024 at its current download pace, which is averaging about 85-90m downloads a quarter.
Most downloaded games in 3Q21
In terms of games, the most popular game that was downloaded the greatest number of times in 3Q21 was PUBG Mobile, followed by My Talking Angela 2 and Garena Free Fire rounding up the Top 3 downloaded games in 3Q21.
Garena Free Fire, owned by Sea Ltd, has seen rapid growth in the past year, ranking as the No. 3 overall game by US revenue in 3Q21. The top-ranking game in terms of US revenue in 3Q21 is Candy Crush Saga, followed by Roblox in No. 2.
Candy Crush is currently owned by Activision Blizzard after the latter purchased its parent King Digital for $5.9bn back in 2015. It is noteworthy to note that Candy Crush, which was released back in 2012, remains the top US revenue-generating game in 3Q21.
Roblox, the second-highest revenue generator in the US, has been growing its revenue steadily every quarter from $110.5m in 1Q19 to $454.1m in its latest 2Q21 results. Despite the company still in “loss-making mode”, it is generating very impressive free cash flow every quarter which could be recycled to continually grow its top-line without the need for external funding.
Despite Garena Free Fire relatively low adoption rates in the US, the game overcame this download gap with much higher revenue per download than its competitors, hence, it has already crossed the $350m gross revenue mark in the US in 2021, despite only being downloaded around 5m times.
Revenue per download for Garena Free Fire is now above $30, more than double that of its closest rival, PUBG Mobile which is trending around the $13 level.
Publishers by worldwide download in 3Q21
The top publisher in terms of worldwide download in 3Q21 is Google, followed by Facebook and AppLovin rounding up the top 3.
AppLovin is probably not a familiar name to most but the company is now worth a massive $37bn in market cap despite still generating losses. Founded in 2012, AppLovin operates under two key divisions.
It’s consumer division which generated 51% of its revenue in 2020, owns a portfolio of over 200 free-to-play games. It significantly expanded this segment by buying smaller studios and signing new partnerships over the past 2 years and more than 200m people now play its games every month.
Its business segment, which generated 49% of its revenue in 2020, helps companies analyze, monetize and publish their apps. Recent acquisitions to expand this segment include buying the mobile-app measurement company Adjust in April as well as buying the mobile advertising network MoPub from Twitter for $1.1bn in October.
The company became a public company on April 2021, trading under the ticker APP, with an initial IPO price of $80/share, but ended its first trading day at $70/share. At close to $100/share, its shares have appreciated more than 40% since its first day of listing.
Sports betting app exploding
Sportsbook apps continued to gain traction as states passed legislation allowing sports betting. Installs spiked in September 2021 at the start of the NFL season.
Some of the top apps like DraftKings, Fan Duel and BetMGM all saw downloads more than double YoY in 3Q21.
I have previously written about 7 investing themes for 2021 in this article, with one of the major themes being that of growth in US online gambling.
I highlighted that more and more states are launching online betting businesses as the legal infrastructure and public opinion have turned in favor of such services.
This will benefit popular online sport betting companies such as DraftKings and Penn National Gaming.
Many of these gaming-related companies have had a good run at the start of 2021 in anticipation of the start of major sporting events resuming such as the NFL but their share prices have since “loss-steam” and retraced substantially from their peak prices achieved back in Mar/Apr 2021.
This might be the case as investors now turned their attention towards these companies generating sustainable growth after the initial euphoria of sports gaming being legalized is over.
Nonetheless, the trend seen in apps download for these sportsbook apps remains a very positive one which could be a prelude to better financial performances for these sport betting companies in the quarters ahead.
Conclusion
Facebook remains the company behind the most popular social media apps that have been downloaded > 20bn times by users all over the world. Facebook is currently looking to transition itself away from being a pure social media company highly dependant on advertising fees as its main source of revenue into a metaverse company that is at the forefront of the Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality trend that is taking shape in a major way in the coming decade.
There are also many interesting companies that you might not be aware of, who are the driving forces behind many of the popular apps that we use almost on a daily basis.
While the US sports betting arena remains a rather controversial industry that not all investors might wish to partake in, this is one industry that could witness strong in the coming quarters when the re-opening trend does indeed gain traction, with major sporting events resuming. Some of the companies highlighted in this article such as DraftKing and Penn National Gaming could find themselves back in favor when such a scenario eventually materializes.
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