Every Wednesday we break down the latest data, research and financial results into digestible chunks.
Read on for the numbers you need to know about without the fluff.
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App Store commission fee cut to 25% in China
Apple has reduced the App Store commission rate in mainland China from 30% to 25% amid global scrutiny of its store fees and following pressure from regulators, the Guardian reports.
The reduction could save domestic developers over $873m in operating costs annually, according to the Chinese state-owned Economic Daily. It is estimated to be the App Store’s second-largest market.
Apple has also cut the commission rate for IAP purchase transactions for developers signed up to its small business and mini apps partner programs from 15% to 12%.
Smartly to acquire Incrmntal
Adtech firm Smartly is buying ad measurement platform Incrmntal for an undisclosed fee. The acquisition combines Smartly’s expertise in data-driven ad and asset creation with Incrmntal’s measurement capabilities to offer advertisers a more complete suite of marketing tools.
Smartly says it supports over 800 brands and manage over $7bn in ad spend globally.
Subway Surfers City hit 5m installs, $500k revenue in 10 days
Sybo’s Subway Surfers City is off to a strong start, racking up 5m downloads and earning over $50ok in its first 10 days, according to Appfigures estimates.
Daily downloads reportedly peaked at 667k on February 28, two days after the sequel launched.
The game doesn’t appear to have had a negative impact on its predecessor’s performance, says Appfigures. The original Subway Surfers is estimated to have averaged about 530k daily downloads before City launched, and about 540k in the 10 days after, for a total of 5.5m during the 10-day comparison window.
Between February 26 and March 7, the original Subway Surfers was the only action game to achieve more downloads than its follow-up. During this period, Subway Surfers City downloads comfortably outpaced those of Free Fire (3m+), Brawl Stars (2m+) and Mobile Legends (2m+).
Appfigures estimates that the original Subway Surfers, which monetises primarily through ads, earned $88k in net revenue during City’s first 10 days of availability.
SayGames hits 8bn downloads
Hyper/hybridcasual game publisher SayGames says its game catalogue recently passed 8bn lifetime downloads.
The label behind hits like My Perfect Hotel, Rush Xtreme and the Draw One Part games also offered eight things it learned along the way in what appears to be an AI-authored blog.
Vita Mahjong leads February’s ad charts
Vita Mahjong was the most advertised game on both iOS and Android for the eighth consecutive month in February, says ad intelligence platform SocialPeta.
Vita Studio’s tile matching puzzle game topped the iOS ad chart ahead of Oakever Games’ Zen Word, Nexon’s MapleStory: Idle RPG, Oakever’s Tile Explorer, and Storm Interactive’s Dying Ember.
On Android, Vita Mahjong was followed by Tile Explorer and Hungry Studio’s Block Blast, while Zen Word and fellow Oakever game Jigsawscapes rounded off the top five.
Adjust’s new gaming insights report, digested
Adjust has published its latest gaming app insights report, which claims global installs fell 3% YoY in 2025, while sessions rose 1%. MENA saw 2% install growth and a 7% rise in sessions.
In Europe and LATAM, installs fell by 7% and 9% respectively, while sessions grew 3% and 0.4%. In APAC, installs and sessions were down 0.4% and 1%, and in North America, installs fell 5% while sessions dropped 2%.
Hypercasual continued to dominate app installs in 2025, representing 29% of the total. Casual, puzzle and hybridcasual games each accounted for 10% of total installs, and action games drove 8% of installs.
Simulation games made up 8.5% of installs, arcade games accounted for 5%, while sports games made up 3% of installs. Strategy, RPG and racing genres each continued to generate less than 3% of total installs.
In 2025, the paid-to-organic ratio grew across almost all game genres YoY, with puzzle being the notable exception. The global median rose by 61%, from 2.07 in 2024 to 3.33.
Casino titles had the highest paid-to-organic ratio (11.05), which was up 223% YoY. Slots and casual games saw jumps of 139% and 446%, respectively, while hypercasual grew 35% to 4.56.
Strategy games saw the biggest YoY increase when it came to global average session lengths in 2025, up 18% to 37.51 minutes. Racing increased 17% to 16.33 minutes, while casual and hypercasual rose by 15% and 13%.
A number of genres that led when it came to session length in 2024 saw declines last year. These included adventure, RPG and action, although the latter still had the longest average session length at 43.8 minutes.
The global day one retention rate for games was unchanged in 2025 at 27%. Hybridcasual and hypercasual enjoyed the highest day one retention rates last year, also both at 27%, followed by family games, then card and swap titles.
Family games experienced the most growth, up five percentage points to 23%, with action (18-19%) and arcade (19-20%) also rising.
Global installs per mille (IPM) climbed from 8.59 in 2024 to 8.62 in 2025. Racing games retained the highest IPM, despite falling to 16.2, ahead of arcade and music games. Casino titles saw the biggest increase, up 65% to 5.13. Other climbers included word, card, swap, family, board and slot games.
Cost per click (CPC) for gaming apps in 2025 increased 33% YoY to $0.04. Strategy had the biggest percentage increase, up 133% to $0.07. Slots more than doubled, rising 106% to $0.35, while swap saw the largest CPC decrease, falling 33% to $0.06.
Global cost per install (CPI) in 2025 was up 30% YoY to $0.56. The biggest growers were slots, which rose to $4.47, idle RPG ($3.19) and strategy ($1.03), but CPI was down for casino, family and swap games.
Cost per mille (CPM) increased 20% YoY to $4.34. The highest CPM categories, casino and slots, grew 17% to $12.22, and 13% to $11.65, respectively. Genres that experienced declines included music (-31% to $1.39), racing (-19% to $2.32) and sports (-17% to $4.83).
