This Week in Apps - Can You Imagine?

This Week in Apps is a short, no-fluff, round-up of interesting things that happened in the mobile industry. Here are our top highlights.

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U.S. Revenue Index (vs. 30 days ago)

Insights

1. The App That Dethroned ChatGPT Isn't What You'd Expect

ChatGPT has been the top app in the US App Store for quite a while, sticking to the #1 position as if it's been glued to the top. But things can change on the App Store very quickly. Very very quickly.

Two weeks ago, a new app pogo-sticked its way into the top of the charts, dethroning ChatGPT and even the latest sensation, Tea.

But unlike recent overnight risers, this one wasn't social or AI. This one's a focus timer....

In case you weren't looking, the app I'm referring to is Focus Friend.

So how does a focus timer shoot up to the top of the charts overnight?

You're ready for me to say TikTok, right? Well, the app belongs to YouTube celebrity Hank Green. You may also know his brother, John Green. Together, the Green brothers are one of the first YouTube celebs.

And yes, TikTok. Hank and John both took to all of their social channels to promote the app - including (and mostly) TikTok - causing it to take off very quickly. And their efforts paid off!

After a week, the app was downloaded 1.4M times from the App Store and Google Play, according to Appfigures Intelligence. And the split between the two platforms is interesting.

I expected most of the downloads to come from the US, but they came from all over. And while most downloads came from the App Store and the US was responsible for the majority of the downloads, the combination wasn't the winner.

In the US, most downloads - roughly 72% - came from Google Play.

Revenue, however, is where things went back to "normal" with the App Store earning 83% of the $370K in net revenue (after fees), according to our estimates. That's a good start, but at around $0.27/download, below the average for similar apps in the segment, which sits at over $1/download.

So far, Focus Friend has made its way into 1.9M devices, earning $800K of net revenue - what the brothers get to keep after paying Apple and Google their fees.

But here's the thing - celebrities, while cool, aren't always enough on their own to make an app sticky at ChatGPT scale. Two weeks in, Focus Friend has dropped to #48 in the Top Overall chart in the US App Store, and as of early September, the app has dropped out of the combined chart entirely.

Getting sticky is hard, and the apps that achieve it don't do it with spikes but rather consistency.

2. Grok's Mobile Revenue More Than Doubled This Summer

If you're on X, you know that in the last couple of months Elon Musk has been pushing Grok's new features in a massive way, actively posting and reposting videos created with Imagine, benchmarks of Grok 4, and updates to its new characters.

xAI has been busy this summer, taking on AI video generation, AI characters, and rolling out a new version of its model.

The features, and Elon's promotion, pushed Grok's revenue to a new high this summer. And the growth came. Faster than any other competitor!

According to Appfigures Intelligence, Grok ended August with $6.8M of net revenue (after store fees), the highest the app has seen since its release late last year.

This isn't ChatGPT money yet, but here's why it's important. In June, Grok's revenue was just $2.6M. That's an increase of 161%, a number no other competitor has seen at the same time. Not even ChatGPT!

The growth came from pretty much everywhere. Every country where Grok is available and was earning money in June has earned more in July and August, which makes sense considering this wasn't an expansion of any kind but rather a feature rollout.

It's interesting to see how quickly updates like these are "consumed" by users. And by consume I mean they're willing to pay for them, not just use them.

I compared this revenue growth to Grok's competition and the data confirmed that this was the Summer of Grok™.

Grok's growth outpaced every single competitor, even though several of them saw double-digit revenue growth this summer.

Gemini and Claude, which got a lot of attention with Veo and Claude Code, respectively, were very popular, and the numbers back it up. Gemini's revenue grew 55% between June and August, and Claude's 40%.

I'm happy to see Claude's consumer app revenue growing. I believe it can still do more - a lot more - but 40% growth is great.

Microsoft Copilot and Perplexity grew 9% and 8%, respectively. It really goes to show that AI doesn't grow revenue - promotion and innovation do. The pair didn't do that much of either, and the numbers confirm it.

The one that would surprise most is ChatGPT, which didn't see any growth - revenue actually dropped by 8% this summer. If you're like me and are watching ChatGPT's numbers closely, you saw the writing on the wall in June, when revenue growth was flat. After all, now that we're a few years into AI, the growth of one platform has to come from another. And this is, again, confirmed by the numbers.

Back to Grok for a moment. This is a lot of growth in a very short amount of time, and it's leading to a very simple question - can Grok sustain this momentum?

It's too early to judge September so we'll have to wait a few more weeks to tell.

Generative AI, be it images or videos, is all the rage now as we see with Gemini's Nano Banana, which pushed Gemini to the top of the US App Store this week. I expect we'll see more on that front from all AI platforms, and will dig into Gemini in a future update.

3. The Multi-Billion Dollar Opportunity TikTok Created that No One's Talking About

TikTok has been the kingmaker of apps this entire year + the highest earning app in the world consistently.

But there's something most people don't ever think about and that's how much money people spend on editing videos for TikTok in TikTok's own video editor, CapCut.

Short answer: A lot!

It's been a while since I looked into CapCut's earnings so I wasn't sure what to expect. On the one hand, CapCut has seen meteoric rise at the expense of past incumbents, but on the other, I'd also expected them to do something about it and stifle that growth.

Well, they haven't. Or, more likely, haven't been able to...

So far this year, CapCut's global net revenue rose 78% to $93.5M in August, according to our estimates. And that's all net, which means what Bytedance gets to keep after Apple and Google deduct their fees. Even if revenue stays flat for the next 12 months - it won't - CapCut is set to earn more than a billion dollars globally.

One interesting trend I noticed when digging into the data was that revenue in China is actually declining while revenue elsewhere is rising.

CapCut has a dedicated iOS app for China, and while its revenue has grown roughly 50% since the beginning of the year, it's been on a downward trend this summer. According to our estimates, net revenue from China started at $21M in January, peaked at $40M in May, and dropped to $35M in August. And that's all after fees.

But despite that, strong growth in the US, where revenue more than doubled on both the App Store and Google Play this year, has pushed global revenue to this new high.

I took a look at competitors Splice and Picsart and despite the summer being a strong season for video editors historically, revenue has been very static. At least revenue didn't decline. But, this performance should be a warning sign for the entire niche.

Can it survive in the age of CapCut?

4. Is Everyone on Vacation? The Most Downloaded Apps in August

August is behind us, marking the end of summer and the return to school and work. But before the gold and glimmer have been replaced, let's see which apps won August.

I crunched the numbers and ranked the most downloaded apps in the world and just like July, TikTok wasn't the winner. Instead, it was ChatGPT that took the crown with 48M new downloads from the App Store and Google Play (but mostly Google Play) in August, according to our estimates.

Appfigures Intelligence shows TikTok came in second with 38M downloads and rival Instagram was tight behind with 35M downloads in August.

Facebook and WhatsApp came round out the top five most downloaded apps in August with 27M and 24M downloads, respectively. And yes, this is exactly the same list that we saw in July.

The entire list was fairly static in August with notable changes being Uber's ascent into the top 10 on the App Store and Threads climbing in the overall chart.

Together, our estimates show the top 10 most downloaded apps in the world make their way into 273M devices in August. A big drop from July, but with more people on vacation than normal, I'm not entirely surprised. Let's see if it'll recover in September.

5. Stream Stream Hooray! The Highest-Earning Apps in August

I crunched the numbers and ranked the highest-earning mobile apps in August and can tell you right now, August was a quiet month, mirroring the stillness we saw on the downloads side.

TikTok was the highest-earning app in the world in August, according to Appfigures Intelligence. Despite a slight revenue drop in August, TikTok's was still the highest earner with $335M of net revenue (after fees), beating every other app across both platforms and when combined. This isn't a new trend nor a trend I expect to see changing any time soon.

ChatGPT cam in second in August. Its revenue also dropped when comparing August to July, but not enough to change its position. We estimate the AI king earned $170M after fees with the majority coming from the App Store.

YouTube, which used to be the consistent second, is now a reliable third. We estimate the video platform earned $137M after fees in August from the App Store (because it isn't using standard in-app purchases on Google Play).

So far, the top three were the same as July but earned less.

Tinder and Disney+ round out the top 5, just like July, but unlike the top portion, both earned more in August. Disney and date?

In fact, every app on our chart in August, with the exception of the top 3, earned more. It's hard to be at the top.

It's worth noting that summer is the best time for streaming, which is why we have four streamers on this chart where we normally only see two. Peacock and Crunchyroll made an appearance at 9th and 10th, respectively. That probably won't last, but it's good to see.

We estimate that together, the top 10 highest-earning apps made $1.3B in August after store fees. A tad bit higher than July but the difference is small enough that it gets rounded away now that we've crossed into big B territory.

App Intelligence for Everyone!

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All figures included in this report are estimated. Unless specified otherwise, estimated revenue is always net, meaning it's the amount the developer earned after Apple and Google took their fee.