A Global Analysis of Mobile Gaming Benchmarks

Feb, 2019 1
A Global Analysis of
Mobile Gaming Benchmarks
2018 Edition
Performance insights from more than 60K mobile games
and over 3 billion players from around the world.

2
What’s inside…
About this report Page 3
Key takeaways Page 4
Engagement
D1 Retention Page 5 – 6
D7 Retention Page 7 – 8
D28 Retention Page 9 – 10
Average Session Length
Page 11 – 12
Stickiness Page 13 – 14
Revenue
ARPPU Page 15 – 16
ARPDAU Page 17 – 18
Conversion
Page 19 – 20
Our Customers
Hear it from the best Page 21 – 22
Voodoo Case Study Page 23 – 26
Other key stats Page 27 – 28
Key analytic features Page 29 – 30

3
How we define our benchmarks
Over a full
calendar year
Data for a full calendar
year, running from July 1st
2017 to June 30th 2018.
60K+ games
studied
We crunched data from
a selection of our 60K+
games which are currently
active on the app stores.
From 3 billion
devices
Our analysis presents
findings from 850 million
monthly active players.
How is this data presented?
To avoid any bias from pre-launch titles skewing
our analysis, we set a minimum threshold of 1,000
daily active users for each game.
For titles that meet this minimum criteria, we’ve
collected our findings and presented the data for
each metric in two separate ways:
1. Overall Yearly View
This is all of the genre data aggregated to
show industry trends over the last year. It has
been broken down into top, median and under-
performing titles (green, yellow and red lines).
2. Genre Specific Breakdown
This graph looks specifically at how each
genre is performing and highlights the top,
median and underperforming KPIs for each
genre category (star, grey line and red arrow).
How to read our graphs
Games with a metric near
this yellow line or symbol are
performing OK, but there’s still
some room for improvement.
Games with KPIs near this red
line or arrow are amongst the
lowest performers compared to
industry averages.
Any game with a metric
near the green line or star is
performing in the top 15% of
games. Good job!
GameAnalytics is a free tool that helps game developers and publishers around
the world to better understand their players, refine gameplay and compare the
performance of their titles to the general trends in the market (benchmarks).

With more than 60K+ titles and 3 billion players analyzed, this report provides an
insightful snapshot into the state of the mobile gaming industry. Throughout this
report, we present our benchmarks to show insights into how the industry is
performing for each genre and metric.

44
Key Takeaways
After 1 day, top performing games show
retention between 35-50%- Page 6
At day 7, the most promising games show
retention between 15-25% – Page 8
By day 28, retention drops dramatically, with
the best performing between 4-6% – Page 10
People play longer in winter (by around 3 minutes),
especially around Christmas – Page 11
As people’s lives start to get busy around the New
Year, stickiness tends to see a drop – Page 13
When it comes to ARPPU, top performing games
generate 3-4x more revenue than other titles
– Page 15
The role playing genre dominates with ARPDAU,
whereas arcade and racing games average much less
– Page 18
Top performing games convert players up to 3x more
than the average – Page 19

5
Any game with KPIs
near the green line
means it’s in the top
performing 15% of
games and doing
well.
Games that are
around the yellow
line are average
when compared
to the industry.
Any games that are
near the red line are
underperforming
against the industry.

Retention (Day 1)
How much potential
do games have?
Day 1 retention looks at how many players return
after 1 day of playing a game. This is a vital KPI to
get a quick impression of a game’s potential.
Games with 35% or
greater day 1 retention are performing well compared to the average.
Yearly Overview for Day 1 Retention
If your day 1
retention is low…
If a game has low day 1
retention, then it’s probably
going to need a massive
overhaul.
Many studios drop under-
performing titles (sometimes
killing games with anything
less than 35%). Although this
can be a hard decision to
make, it’s sometimes better to
cut losses and move on to the
next project.
Thanks!
If a game has more than 40% day 1 retention,
then it is doing really well.
Anything below 30% retention isn’t considered
good and may not be financially viable in the long
term.
Kids games have extremely low retention –
15% is above average for this genre.
Key takeaways:

6
40% day 1 retention is
above average, but 35% and upwards is still promising.
Breakdown of Genre for Day 1 Retention
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games
*All genres are listed in alphabetical order and based on the App Store categories.

Retention (Day 7)
Are players still coming back
after a week?
Similar to day 1 retention, day 7 looks specifically at
players who come back to a game after a week of
playing. Naturally, this will be lower than day 1 retention.
As expected, there’s a
decrease in retention around Christmas
and Summer holidays.
Yearly Overview for Day 7 Retention
Perfect your in-game
core loop
Players can lose interest in
repetitive things easily, which
is a valid reason why day 7
retention can suffer.
When repeating core loops
in games, it’s important to
make sure players can unlock
new content, be that items,
areas or levels. Don’t let them
get bored!
Retention to day 7 shows seasonality for the
top 15% games.
Retention tends to decrease around Christmas
and in Summer holidays.
A typical Word game has 16% day 7 retention,
compared to just 1% for Kids games.
Key takeaways:
Good to know
7

8
Games with day 7 retention of between 15-30% are
performing particularly well.
Breakdown of Genre for Day 7 Retention
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games

Retention (Day 28)
Players that come back after 28
days are truly engaged.
With so much competition out there, retaining
players for a full month can be difficult. Naturally,
we see a dramatic drop-off when it comes to day
28 retention.
Highest day 28 retention
is in the cold and boring
quarter , before Christmas.
Yearly Overview for
Day 28 Retention
Consider the endgame
The endgame is important
to keep players engaged.
Although tricky to design,
great endgames allow users
to continue enjoying core
gameplay.
PVP modes, daily challenges
and leaderboards are all great
options to keep users excited.
If players are still playing
after 28 days, they really
love that game. But then
what?
The highest values are low. The best performing
games show 6% retention D28.
The bottom 15% have a D28 retention of 0%, showing
how difficult it is to retain players for a full month.
The highest retention is in the cold and boring
quarter , just before Christmas.
Key takeaways:
9

10
Games with more than
6% day 28 retention are
performing particularly well.
Breakdown of Genre for Day 28 Retention
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games

11
Average session length
How long do people play
for on average?
The average session length looks at how long
users play a game, from initially opening the app to
when the session is closed and sent to the background.
People play longer in winter
(by around 3 minutes),
especially around Christmas.
Yearly Overview for
Average Session Length
Reward loyal players
Users ultimately control
how long they play for, so it’s
important to not limit their
gameplay. If they complete
10 levels within a game and
end up playing for 20
minutes, these players should
be rewarded to make sure
they have a good experience.
This should apply to any
stage of gameplay,
whether they are returning
after 1 day, 7 or 28.
Makes sense!
People play longer in winter (by around
3 minutes), especially around Christmas.
ASL is slightly decreasing for underperforming
titles, indicating that the top 15% actively engage
players with marketing campaigns.
Casino and Card are the genres with longest
ASL (these genres have a great deal of overlap).
Key takeaways:

12
Players spend considerably more time in Casino and Card games – up to 35 minutes per session!
Breakdown of Genre for Average Session Length
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games

Stickiness
How engaged are players in a game?
To break this down, stickiness is the
DAU-to-MAU ratio, which essentially means
how many monthly users play each day.
As people’s lives start to get busy towards the holidays,
stickiness tends to drop just before Christmas and the New Year.
Yearly Overview
for Stickiness
How to keep them loyal
Promotions, giveaways and
freebies are always a nice
way to reward regulars.
Ultimately however, it all
comes down to content.
If players are denied new
challenges or fresh gameplay,
then they will lose interest and
move on to the next game.
Most games decrease slightly around
Christmas and New Year, with a small rise
after New Year’s Eve.
The peak is around October, with another peak
before Chinese New Year.
The 5 top performing genres for this metric are
Board, Card, Casino, Puzzle and Word, with more
than 25% Stickiness.
Key takeaways:
How can I increase
engagement and keep
my players loyal?
13

14
For most genres, having less than 7% stickiness is considered bad.
Breakdown of Genre for Stickiness
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games

15
ARPPU
How much do users spend?
In this section, we look at the average revenue per
paying user across games on our platform.
To keep the data clean and accurate, we’ve only
considered games with actual revenue.
For ARPPU, the top performing
titles are seeing an average of $25, the median $7, whereas the bottom performing are seeing just $2.
Yearly Overview for ARPPU
How to increase
player spend
There are loads of ways to
encourage players to spend
more in a game, including
push notifications, timely
promotions and dynamic
pricing to cater for different
player demographics.
Before optimising IAP,
developers should focus on
overall gameplay. After all,
people can’t spend money if
they aren’t playing that game.
Spending habits are highest in the lead up to the
holidays, suggesting the top performing games
ramp up their marketing efforts around here.
There is little difference between the average and
underperforming games, but there is a 3-4x gap
between them and the top performing titles.
For top performing genres, Casino, Role Playing
and Strategy stand out as the highest performers –
with ARPPU up to $40.
Key takeaways:

16
For top performing games, Casino, Role Playing and Strategy stand out as the highest performers – with ARPPU up to $40.
Breakdown of Genre for ARPPU
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games
*Please note, ARPPU data has been calculated on a daily basis.

17
ARPDAU
How much are players spending
in a game in one day?
We break down average revenue per daily active
user to see how much money a developer makes
from a user in a single day. Similar to ARPPU, we
only consider games with actual revenue.
Yearly Overview for ARPDAU
For ARPDAU, top performing games
are doing 6x better than the median and
bottom, suggesting they’re running more
successful campaigns to convert players.
Offers are key
Providing in-game offers to
your players is key to
increasing your ARPDAU.
Player types should be
considered in these offers, as
well as how much they can
actually afford. A/B testing
different price points is a
good tactic to see which IAP
amounts players prefer, and
to get a grasp of what their
budget will allow.

Thanks for the tip!
The role playing genre dominates, whereas
arcade games perform the worst, on average.
Again, there is little difference between average and
underperforming games, but a 6-7x gap between
them and the top performing titles.
Strategy and role playing games as a whole are
performing up to 2x better than more other genres.
Key takeaways:

18
Breakdown of Genre for ARPDAU
Genre median Top performing gamesUnderperforming games
The role playing genre
dominates, however Strategy
games perform up to 2x better
than most other genres.

Conversion
Which genre gets the most
players converting?
Conversion data is the percentage of users
who made a purchase that day. In the following
graphs, the conversion rate is analysed on a
daily basis.
Values are very low in
general: a game with 1.2% is performing particularly well.
Yearly Overview for Daily Conversion
How to increase
conversion
Developers should know
what will help players with
their gameplay and push
offers and promotions
relating to these.
A couple of examples include
knowing which level they get
stuck on, when they need
extra lives or if they have
run out of hints.
Reactive in-game offers
are a great way to remind
players of the items they can
purchase, and can make the
game more helpful.
There was a peak around New Year’s Eve for
top 15% games.
Average games are converting, however the top
performing titles are getting 3x more in comparison.
Role playing games have up to 2x better conversion
rates than other top performing genres.
Key takeaways:
19

20
Role playing games have up to
2x better conversion rates than
other top performing genres.
Breakdown of Genre for Daily Conversion
Genre median Top performing games Underperforming games

21
“I use GameAnalytics
daily to track core KPIs
for our range of our
games. It’s an essential
tool for all data driven
gaming studios. Highly
recommended.”
Gabriel Rivaud | VP of Games
Hear what the
best have to say
52,000+ game developers use
GameAnalytics in more than 60K titles.
“From deep-dives to health-
checks and benchmarking,
GameAnalytics is my source
of truth.”
Ryan McLeod | Creator of Blackbox “The tools from GameAnalytics
have helped us increase our
monetization performance
by up to 30% for several of
our Messenger titles.”
Alexander Krug | CEO
“We use GameAnalytics to get
all the insight we need about
our players on all platforms,
from iOS to FB Instant.”
Chris Benjaminsen | Founder
Trusted by the world’s
leading developers
Player 6
21

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“I really like the GameAnalytics
platform. It’s an excellent free
tool that helps to shape many
of our daily decisions.”
Alexander Krug | CEO
Nate Barker | Director of BD
22
“I really like the
GameAnalytics platform.
It’s an excellent free tool
that helps to shape many
of our daily decisions.”
Marcus Dawson | CEO
“Our continued success is dependent on GameAnalytics
providing critical gaming KPIs at our fingertips.”
“We absolutely love
GameAnalytics. The real-
time metrics are a lifesaver
for tracking our campaigns.”
Matti Kallonen | CEO
“Game Analytics help us to
understand at the player
behaviour in both macro and
micro level. We rely on it.”
Mark C. Wang | Co-Founder
“GameAnalytics is an essential
tool to help us understand how
people are playing Crossy Road
– love it!”
Andy Sum | Co-Founder
Player 17

How GameAnalytics helps
Voodoo identify and release hit
mobile games each month
CASE STUDY
Taking a game from initial conception,
through prototype phases and on to a
financially successful launch is a difficult
task for even the most established of games
studios. It’s even more challenging for those
in the hyper-casual space, especially when
you consider the short lifespans of these
types of mobile games.
For publishers like Voodoo, using data to
identify titles with the best potential, as well
as optimize core gameplay loops, is key to
their continued success. CHALLENGE
Voodoo uses GameAnalytics to get
predictive insights about early-phase
games. They’re able to quickly shortlist the
most promising new titles from hundreds of
different games pitched to them each month
by reviewing KPIs like D1 and D7 retention.
What’s more, GameAnalytics helps Voodoo
gather crucial feedback based on data, so
that they can consult with their partners and
give actionable advice to improve the core
metrics and gameplay in each title that they
work on.
SOLUTION
1+ billion
PLAYERS
120
EMPLOYEES
iOS & Android
PLATFORM
23

Player 3
Where it all began
Voodoo actually started off as a small team developing and releasing their own games.
What originally began as a failed attempt to bring their titles Bool and Quiz Run to
market set in motion a journey to hone the process of mobile games publishing. Using
what they had learnt – tirelessly optimizing UA and monetization strategies – Voodoo
adapted their approach and published Paper.io, which became their first major hit back
in 2016.
These first few releases taught Voodoo two things. Firstly, that the most successful
publishers need practical experience in many areas of game marketing. Secondly, if
they really wanted to make the most of their knowledge of user acquisition and
monetization, they would have to apply this to more titles than just their own.
Paper.io
20+ million downloads
Released: Dec 2016
One of Voodoo’s first major successes.
An instantly playable title that’s still
popular for its charming UI and intuitive
gameplay.
Snake VS Block
87+ million downloads
Released: May 2017
Blending two iconic games to create a
new and unique mechanic. Snake VS
Block is a great example of outside the
box thinking.
Dune!
56+ million downloads
Released: Oct 2017
A visual reworking of a classic format.
Dune! demands expert timing, but
offers sleek graphics and energetic
gameplay.
Rolly Vortex
44+ million downloads
Released: Aug 2017
Maneuver a ball through obstacles with-
in a vortex. This game cleverly brings
into play progression mechanics like
levelling up.
Helix Jump
310+ million downloads
Released: Feb 2018
One of the biggest hyper-casual hits of
all time. Bouncing a ball sounds simple
enough, but it’s a tricky game to master.
Hole.io
40+ million downloads
Released: May 2018
Swallow everything in your path, grow
your hole, and kill opponents – there’s
something deeply satisfying about this
game.
* Information based on App Annie statistics from November 2017 – November 2018
JUST A FEW OF VOODOO’S NOTABLE HITS
24

Player 44
25
A shift to publishing
Voodoo made the decision to shift their efforts and apply what they’d learnt to the
wider market, leveraging their skill set to launch several games at any given time. In
order to scale quickly, they wrote a script to scrape the Google Play store, allowing
them to quickly compile the details of thousands of studios for outreach campaigns.
This efficient approach, combined with data collection and analysis using
GameAnalytics, helped Voodoo to identify a new game called Fight List (based largely
on its promising D1 and D7 KPIs). It quickly became a hit on the App Stores, reaching
#1 position in more than 40 countries. The key takeaway here: Voodoo’s game adoption
strategy streamlines the development and review process, whilst minimizing the
commercial risk of launching several titles.
Identifying core potential
When it comes to predicting the success of a title, simply playing the game is rarely
enough. Data is key for recognizing the games with the greatest potential, and
Voodoo reviews this data with user-level access to multiple studios at any given time
via GameAnalytics. They typically look for D1 retention of 50% or greater.
Around 19/20 games with low retention get set aside, whilst studios with promising
numbers and a great concept are given consultation to help improve core gameplay
elements. Voodoo has now become a world leader at finding and refining diamonds in
the rough, using GameAnalytics to see critical KPIs (and even game error logs).

Player 5
Tracking an entire portfolio
Once a game has been released, GameAnalytics still plays a role in progress tracking
for the entire Voodoo team, with custom integration via the GameAnalytics Rest API
that feeds GameAnalytics data into their own proprietary dashboard.
Within this platform, product managers, game designers and even partner developers
work together, using GameAnalytics as a way to regularly monitor and optimize the
lifecycle of each and every game across their entire portfolio.
A word from Voodoo
“At Voodoo we review hundreds of games each month. Thanks to the data collected
with GameAnalytics we’re able to help our partners with upcoming trends, clear
creation guidelines, features to increase retention and a unique ideation process.”
“One of the great perks of working as a publisher is seeing how the titles of
enthusiastic developers can be optimised to make a huge impact on their success.
With the many different GameAnalytics SDKs and a custom API integration into
our own platform, we can synchronise insights and feedback with our partners and
streamline the consultancy process. Using data to make judgements and informed
decisions has proved critical to our success.”
Hugo Peyron
PUBLISHING EXPERT |
26

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Other cool stats
you should know
Rewarding multiple daily sessions is
growing
News from GameRefinery shows that rewarding multiple daily sessions
has become more common within the top 100 grossing games, rising
from 25% to 34% year-on-year.
Average lifespan of a top 50 grossing
game is 27.75 days
Apptopia identified that the average lifespan for a game to stay within
the top 50 grossing ranks is 27.75 days. They also found that the top 50
grossing iOS mobile games in the US accounted for 76% of the total
revenue.
More than 50% of spend on the iOS app
store comes from Asia
Research from App Annie shows that over 50% of Global iOS App Store
spend in 2017 was in the APAC Region, and over 70% of spend in each
region went to games.
27

1st impression pays between 27% to 43%
more than the average eCPM
Research from Soomla shows that in mobile apps, the 1st impression
typically pays between 27% to 43% more than the average eCPM.
Soomla also found that some advertisers churn 3x more users than
others when placed as ads in an app.
Top companies are willing to spend
$500 CPI on super whales
According to Game of Whales, the top grossing companies are willing
to spend more than $500 CPI for their super whales (especially when
they can earn up to $10K in their game).
Mobile games will account for 76%
of global app revenue in 2019
Statistics from Newzoo show that mobile apps will take an estimated
revenue of $107.9 Billion in 2019, with mobile games accounting for
76% of this figure.
28

29
Features any great
analyst should use
Stay up-to-date with
custom dashboards
Build, annotate and share custom
dashboards with different stakeholders
across your studio, so everyone sees
the metrics that matter most to them.
We’ve listed some of the most powerful GameAnalytics features you
should use to level up your games and keep your players happy.
29
View your
entire portfolio
Easily search, find, pin, and access
your most important titles from one
convenient view. Get a quick snapshot
into the health of your studio, or even
the games that you’ve helped publish.

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analytics to the next level?
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Slice and dice data
until it’s just right
View and report on the exact data
slice you need, then identify player
segments with advanced combinations
of filters – across multiple dimensions!
Change the game
experience without
updating code
Create variables inside the Command
Center which automatically update to
your players’ devices, allowing you to
trigger certain campaigns, or even adjust
the price of in-game items on the fly.
Learn how campaigns
influence players
See metrics relating to specific
audience groups and track changes
over time to find out how well a
particular campaign, promotion, or
in-game update is doing.
30

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