Analysts: Games responsible for 80% of all mobile app spending in 2017

Spending on mobile games was 3.6 times greater than spending on home game consoles and 2.3 times greater than that of PC and Mac games, reports industry analyst firms App Annie and IDC. 

A joint report published by the two companies aims to highlight the growth mobile games have seen in past few years by looking at trends in consumer spend and downloads, the changing role of live multiplayer games, and more.

That report found that, despite only accounting for roughly 35 percent of worldwide downloads, mobile games on the App Store and Google Play were responsible for nearly 80 percent of worldwide consumer spending.

Looking a little deeper, iOS players notably spent about twice as much in-game than Google Play users as well.

Much of the growth mobile games saw during 2017 was the result of rising interest in China, Japan, and South Korea as well. All but two of the top grossing games across iOS, Google Play, and handheld systems were created by developers headed in those regions as well and over 60 percent of worldwide mobile game spending came from those countries.

The full report dives a bit deeper into all of this data, of course, and provides a look at the growth of PvP games on mobile along with lists of the worldwide top grossing games. That document can be downloaded for free from App Annie.