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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Fallout Shelter hits 230m downloads
Bethesda’s mobile spin-off is celebrating its tenth birthday and has now passed 230m downloads across all platforms, according to the publisher. It’s on Steam as well as iOS and Android. To mark the milestone Bethesda has added seasons to the game, the first of which, Viva New Vegas, ties into the Amazon Prime TV show.
2026 downloads could fall to pre-pandemic levels
Mobile game market downloads across iOS and Android will drop to pre-pandemic levels in 2026, Sensor Tower has predicted.
For the first three quarters of 2025, the research firm pegs mobile game downloads at 36.94bn, a figure it expects to rise to 48.85bn by the end of the year.
In 2026, that figure is forecast to decline by 4.6% YoY to 46.62bn, including a quarterly low of 11.29bn downloads in Q3.
“If the current download trends continue, total mobile game market downloads will hit pre-pandemic levels next year, making it more important than ever for mobile games to combine ad-friendly hooks with strong monetization,” Sensor Tower said.
Mobile drives 15m Where Winds Meet player peak
Open-world action-adventure RPG Where Winds Meet has reached a new milestone of 15m players following its mobile launch on December 12, according to publisher NetEase.
The game racked up over 5m mobile pre-registrations and has claimed the number one spot on the App Store free charts in 60 countries, it said. First released for PC and PS5 on November 14, the game attracted 2m players within 24 hours and 9m in two weeks.
Gossip Harbor hit a merge 2 revenue record in October
Microfun’s Gossip Harbor generated approximately $62m in monthly IAP revenue in October, “the highest historical figure the merge 2 genre has ever recorded so far”, Appmagic reports.
Based on its data, Gossip Harbor is comfortably Microfun’s most successful title to date. Since it launched in June 2022, it has earned over $723m in IAP revenue and racked up 92.4m downloads.
Microfun’s second biggest game is fellow 2022 release Seaside: Merge and Story, which has generated $302m in IAP revenue off the back of 27.3m downloads. 2021 release Merge County is third with $92m in IAP revenue and 9.4m downloads.
Mobile game revenue in Q1-Q3 up 13.2% YoY to $82.5bn
Global mobile game revenue (excluding mainland China) in Q1-Q3 2025 increased 13.2% YoY to reach an estimated $82.5bn. That’s according to data from Insightrackr, which is presented in a new report from Mobvista’s XMP.
Android generated 60.4% of overall revenue during the first three quarters, with iOS contributing 39.6%. Over two thirds (67.8%) of the total was from IAP, with 32.2% coming from in-app advertising.
Downloads for the first nine months of 2025 totalled 38.9bn, marking a 7.4% YoY increase. Android accounted for 80.8% (~31.43bn) of overall installs, and iOS for 19.2% (~7.47bn).
The leading mobile game genre by revenue in Q1-Q3 was RPG with $7.6bn, made up of $6.4bn in IAP (84%) and $1.2bn (16%) in IAA. It was followed by strategy games with $6.8bn in revenue, of which IAP contributed $5.1bn (75%).
In contrast, shooters and puzzle games derived most of their revenue from IAA. This monetisation model accounted for 69% of the $6.1bn generated by shooters, and 80% of the $4.6bn earned by puzzle games.
The top five mobile game genres by downloads were hypercasual (5.7bn), puzzle (4.5bn), action (3.3bn), racing (2.4bn) and management sim (2bn).
Jigsawscapes was the leading game by ad creative volume between January and September 2025, ahead of Vita Mahjong, Paint by Number Coloring Game, Tile Explorer: Tiles Clear and Zen Color – Color by Number.
Titles from Oakever Games took six out of the top 20 places on the ad creative volume chart. Vita Studio, with two top 20 entries, was the only other publisher to register more than one.
Video dominated mobile game advertising in Q1-Q3 with an 80.9% share of ad creatives. Image creatives accounted for 13.7% of the total, and playable ads for 5.4%.
South America had the highest number of ad creatives between January and September, with 2.47m, followed by Europe with 2.41m, North America with 2.3m and Southeast Asia with 2.26m.
Resident Evil Survival Unit has earned $2.8m
Resident Evil Survival Unit has earned $2.8m within its first month, according to Appmagic data. The strategy game, which was co-developed by Joycity and publisher Aniplex, peaked at $193k in daily revenue during its launch week, and is now earning around $100k daily.
Having hit 1m downloads in one day, and 2m in 10 days, it currently sits at around 2.8m installs. Its player base is estimated to be 88% male and 12% female.
Based on Appmagic data, the top five strategy games by revenue year-to-date are Last War: Survival ($1.5bn), Whiteout Survival ($1.3bn), Kingshot ($398m), Last Z: Survival Shooter ($222m) and Evony: The King’s Return ($210m).
