TikTok, PUBG Mobile were most popular apps of 2019 in India: Report

With the penetration of mobile phones, the reliance on the device has increased many folds. Be it shopping, gaming or banking, there has been an immense growth in the hours people spend on their mobile phones. 

According to App Annie's latest report, TikTok and PUBG Mobile continued to dominate the mobile space in India. TikTok was the breakout social app of 2019 in the Indian market, while PUBG Mobile saw the highest consumer spend in games in the country.

PUBG Mobile remained a distant third in breakout games of 2019 in terms of downloads as Carrom Pool clinched the top spot, followed by Free Fire. However, it bagged the top spot in the same category from consumer spend point of view. 

The rankings are based on year-on-year growth in both Apple’s iOS and Google Play downloads.

While TikTok was ahead of all social media apps in India, according to AppAnnie, the larger trend was that hyper-local social apps grew in demand with consumers looking for smaller circles rather than sticking to just the bigger apps such as Facebook.

Global time spent in TikTok grew 210% year-on-year in 2019, both from expanding user bases and increasing time spent per user, the report said.

The growth of food delivery apps was the highest in India with over 400 per cent rise during the period 2017-19. The health and fitness apps also flourised during the same period with 150 per cent growth in engagement and spend.

Apart from this, India also contributed to the growth of fintech apps as the country was only next to China in terms of total sessions. Google Pay was the breakout finance app for 2019 in India, followed by CashBean, KreditBee, PhonePe and YONO SBI.

Tinder dominated in global consumer spend in dating apps. It was the second highest non-gaming app for consumer spend over the last decade. Globally, time spent in sports apps has grown 30% from 2017 to 2019.

Here's what the trend looks like for 2017-19:

Video streaming

With the boom in video streaming apps, India also saw the highest growth in time people spend on entertainment apps with 80 per cent rise in the last two years, According AppAnnie’s ‘State of Mobile 2020’ report. Globally consumers are spending 50 per cent more sessions on their entertainment apps in 2019 compared to 2017. 

The top streaming apps in India were MX Player, Hotstar, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and JioTV based on year-over-year growth in time spent on Android phones among entertainment or video players. 

YouTube Music saw 980% growth in worldwide active users from Dec 2017 to Dec 2019.

Mobile Gaming

Mobile games in 2019 saw 25% more spend than in all other gaming combined. It is on track to surpass $100 bn across all mobile app stores in 2020, the report said. While PUBG Mobile topped the charts in action core game, Puzzle Games saw the most time spent among casual games.

Shopping

The demand for shopping apps grew 20% from 2018 to 2019 to over 5.4 billion, globally. The time spent on shopping apps in India grew 50% from 2018 to 2019 — second highest among markets analyzed. 

Bricks-and-Clicks apps saw strong gains in total sessions year-on-year, often out-pacing Digital-First apps in their respective markets, a notable change from past years. 

In India, Amazon topped the breakout retail apps category in 2019, followed by Flipkart and Paytm.