A seismic shift in mobile app spending is here, and it's all thanks to AI! In 2025, a groundbreaking year, consumers spent more on non-game apps than games, a first-time global phenomenon. This trend, revealed by Sensor Tower's 'State of Mobile' report, shows a 21% surge in app spending worldwide, totaling a staggering $85 billion. But here's the real kicker: Generative AI is the star of the show.
Generative AI apps witnessed an explosion in revenue, with in-app purchases tripling to over $5 billion. Downloads doubled, too, reaching 3.8 billion. This boom can be attributed to the rising popularity of AI assistants, with ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and DeepSeek leading the charge. ChatGPT alone brought in an impressive $3.4 billion in global in-app purchase revenue, a figure we reported on last year.
And it's not just about the money. Users are spending more time than ever on these apps. In 2025, they spent 48 billion hours on generative AI apps, a 3.6x increase from 2024 and a massive 10x jump from 2023. The number of sessions, a sign of user engagement, hit one trillion in 2025, growing faster than new downloads.
But why the sudden surge? Big tech companies like Google, Microsoft, and X are investing heavily in AI assistants to rival ChatGPT. They've been introducing new features rapidly, enhancing coding, content creation, and more. For instance, ChatGPT's GPT-4o image generation model and Google's Nano Banana have made waves.
The market is evolving quickly. OpenAI and DeepSeek now dominate nearly 50% of global AI app downloads, up from 21% in 2024. Big tech companies have also expanded their market share from 14% to 30%, overshadowing former ChatGPT competitors.
Mobile devices are the gateway to this AI revolution. Sensor Tower estimates that over 200 million U.S. users accessed AI assistants by the end of 2025, with more than half using mobile exclusively. This is a significant shift from 2024, when only 13 million users were mobile-only.
Beyond assistants, AI apps like Suno (music generation), Jimeng AI (text-to-video), and companion apps like Character.ai and PolyBuzz have gained popularity. But AI wasn't the sole driver; social media, video streaming, and productivity apps also contributed to the growth. Consumers now spend an average of 90 minutes daily on social media apps, totaling 2.5 trillion hours, a 5% annual increase.
This shift raises questions: Is AI the future of mobile apps? Will big tech companies' investments in AI assistants pay off? And how will this impact the app market in the long run? The answers may be controversial, but one thing's for sure: AI is reshaping the mobile app landscape, and the future looks exciting.
