Mobile News Consumption

The Top 5 Mobile App Trends of 2020

LisaMoshfegh — Tue, 01 Dec 2020 17:45:49 +0000

The Top 5 Mobile App Trends of 2020

By Lisa Moshfegh, Product Marketing

LisaMoshfegh Tue, 12/01/2020 - 09:45

2020-12-01

1. Society Ground to a Halt

As COVID-19 began to spread, non-essential business closed, schools transitioned to distance learning, and most recreational activities were paused or canceled. Governments issued stay-at-home orders to further limit the spread, which forced the most people to stay home. The transition to working from home and reduction in travel turned financial districts and airports into ghost towns. And with restaurants closed, many people chose to cook for themselves or order takeout. In fact, while usage of recipe and takeout apps increased during shelter-in-place, usage of restaurant apps declined by 36%. In addition, we analyzed traffic to both airport and financial districts across the United States to gain insights into people’s movement.

In the chart above, we show the percent change in daily mobile app users in U.S. financial districts beginning in March, when the pandemic went into full swing, comparing each month to baseline usage from January. We display this change in blue against the rising number of new coronavirus cases in gray. Starting in April, travel to financial districts plummeted by 60% compared to pre-coronavirus levels. Read the full report here on the dramatic decline of traffic to America’s largest financial districts.

2. App Category Booms and Busts

The onset of COVID-19 forced most Americans to shelter-in-place as non-essential businesses and schools closed. As people suddenly found themselves with more free time, many reached for mobile devices to help pass the time. And while aggregate app usage is up, usage across individual app categories varies wildly. Let’s check out the top movers.

In the chart above we show the percent change in monthly sessions compared to the January 2020 baseline for the top changing app categories. On the right, we rank app categories based on their app usage growth since the beginning of the year. A surge across Investment apps were the result of wildly volatile financial markets. And as gyms and yoga studios closed, Health & Fitness apps spiked by helping people maintain a workout regiment. On the other end, Sports and Food & Drink suffered double-digit declines as sporting events were cancelled and restaurants were forced to close. Read our full analysis of all app categories from January to July.

3. Mobile Gaming Exploded

As people spent unprecedented amounts of time at home, with limited recreational activities, mobile gaming filled the void. In an earlier report, we concluded that the quarantine created such an unusual surge in mobile gaming that every day was like Sunday. The typical weekend spikes were erased, and every day saw elevated usage. On average, mobile gaming sessions were up by 21% compared to the pre-coronavirus levels! Although much of this growth was driven by Gen Z who found themselves with minimal schooling and limited recreational activities, mobile gamers of all generations were gaming more.

In the chart above, we plot 2020 game sessions by user in dark blue. The light blue line represents 2019, to illustrate the increase in usage that occurred this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2020, mobile gamers averaged 17% more gaming sessions than in 2019. Considering that gaming is one of the largest app categories, even modest increases are remarkable.

4. Mobile News Consumption Soared

The first two months of 2020 began with a standoff with Iran, the impeachment trial of a sitting U.S. President, and the death of a basketball icon. Then COVID-19 began to spread, forcing governments to issue shelter-in-place orders that led to economic uncertainty. As the country attempted to recover from the initial COVID-19 wave, the death of an unarmed African American man at the hands of the Minneapolis police department triggered a global movement calling for racial equality. These headlines culminated with a tumultuous campaign for the United States Presidency that resulted in the most votes ever cast in a U.S. election. All of these stories led to massive spikes in mobile news consumption. Let’s take a look.

In the chart above, we chart daily mobile news app sessions in the U.S. for both 2019 and 2020. We show 2019 in light blue and 2020 in dark blue to demonstrate just how significant this year has been for mobile apps in the News category. You can read our earlier report covering mobile news consumption for the first half of 2020 here and our second report specifically highlighting the leadup to the U.S. Presidential election here.

5. Apps Reduced Ad Revenue Dependence

Many app developers’ bottom lines got hit with a double-whammy in 2020. First, the economic uncertainty due to COVID-19 caused many advertisers to reduce ad spending. And second, Apple announced at WWDC that iOS developers would have to gain permission from end users to share data with third parties, which is expected to reduce CPMs for iOS apps running ads. Although Google has yet to announce similar privacy measures, there is speculation that Android app developers could face a similar fate. Let’s review what changes app developers made to their business model in light of these two shifts.

In the chart above, we analyze the change in share of advertising-only revenue models compared to a January 2020 baseline to understand if app developers are in fact moving away from advertising-supported business models. We separate the two operating systems, with Android on the left and iOS on the right. Typically, Android apps rely more on advertising than iOS apps, largely due to Google simplifying the process of incorporating ads into mobile apps. Given this reliance on advertising as a source of monetization, Android developers were much more impacted by the reduction in ad spend due to COVID-19. However, the chart shows consistent recovery throughout the year as advertising spend slowly increased. iOS developers, on the other hand, were less impacted by the reduction in ad spend, but are still moving away from an advertising-only revenue model, likely because of the impending privacy changes Apple is expected to launch in early 2021. You can find our full report on shifting business models for app developers here.

Make sure you subscribe to the Flurry blog and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn for the latest reports on the mobile industry, including holiday forecasts and 2021 predictions.

The Flurry blog (https://www.flurry.com/blog/) is an independent blog and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc.

Mobile App News Consumption Explodes as U.S. Presidential Election Hangs in the Balance

LisaMoshfegh — Fri, 06 Nov 2020 02:31:35 +0000

Mobile App News Consumption Explodes as U.S. Presidential Election Hangs in the Balance

By Estelle Laziuk, Flurry Analyst

LisaMoshfegh Thu, 11/05/2020 - 18:31

2020-11-05

Tags

Mobile Insights

App Category Insights

Mobile News Consumption

2020 has featured some of the biggest events in modern history —a global pandemic, an impeached U.S. President, widespread protests over social injustice, and a wildly volatile economy. According to Pew Research, 83% of Americans believe that who wins the presidency during this unprecedented time matters more now than it has over the past two decades. As a result, the rate of voter turnout has broken levels not seen since 1900. In this report, we look at the remarkable spike in news consumption driven by this year’s U.S. Presidential election.

Flurry Analytics, owned by Verizon Media, is used in over 1 million mobile applications, providing aggregated insights across more than 2 billion mobile devices per month. For this analysis, Flurry measured news consumption using the number of sessions in mobile news apps covering political and current events. We ensured our sample of news apps represents a mix of left, centrist and right leaning news outlets.

Let’s start by looking at news consumption levels during 2020 versus 2019, including news consumption this week.

In the chart above, we show daily news app sessions leading up to the day after the Presidential election, November 4, 2020. We compare consumption this year in dark blue versus last year in light blue.

The first thing you’ll notice is the considerable increase in news consumption around the Presidential Election day this year, dwarfing every news event before it, in both 2019 and 2020. Scanning from left to right, starting with the first presidential debate, the election period this year was marked by a number of news spikes that exceeded news app consumption during the same period in 2019 by nearly 50%. These spikes include typical election events such as debates and conventions as well as one-off news cycles including when President Trump contracted coronavirus or when his campaign website was hacked. And once again, news consumption surged on Election Day, soaring even higher the day after the election. On November 4, as the world eagerly awaited election results, news consumption more than doubled during this year’s election period (Sept 25 - Nov 2), and more than tripled compared to the same day last year.

With political news reaching remarkable heights this year, we further compared news consumption during the 2020 election period to that of 2016.

In the chart above, we show the percent increase in news consumption during Republican and Democratic Conventions on the left-hand side, and Presidential Debates on the right. For each of the events, we measure the increase in news consumption compared to an average day in its respective month. We show a side-by-side comparison of this year in dark blue and the 2016 Presidential Election year in light blue.

While engagement with the Democratic and Republican Conventions this year did not change considerably compared to the previous elections, Americans this year engaged more with the Presidential Debates, especially the head-to-head debates. News app sessions during the first and third presidential debate increased by 13 and 10 percentage points respectively. With the second presidential debate canceled and replaced by Town Halls this year, news sessions decreased, but only by 1 point. This suggests that Americans engaged much more with the elections this year than in 2016.

This year’s elections have driven significantly higher news engagement compared to both last year and the 2016 Presidential Election. Additionally, this year’s tight race between the two candidates —along with delayed election results— have amplified and extended the surge in election news consumption. With President Trump’s baseless comments regarding election fraud, calls for the vote counting process to stop, and threats that he may not relinquish his office, we anticipate continued spikes in election news consumption post election results. Make sure you subscribe to the Flurry Analytics blog and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn to get the latest industry analyses.

Mobile News App Consumption Surges in 2020

Anonymous — Tue, 30 Jun 2020 17:52:30 +0000

Mobile News App Consumption Surges in 2020

By Estelle Laziuk, Flurry Analyst

Anonymous Tue, 06/30/2020 - 10:52

2020-06-30

Tags

Mobile Insights

App Category Insights

Mobile News Consumption

2020 has featured an unusually high concentration of major events that have dominated the news. The first quarter included mounting tensions with Iran, President Trump’s impeachment trial, and the untimely death of Kobe Bryant. The second quarter focused on the rise of Coronavirus, economic uncertainty and national protests about racial injustice. The result has been a significant, sustained increase in the consumption of news, including in mobile apps. In this report, Flurry takes a look at news consumption patterns in mobile news applications across the first six months of 2020.

Flurry Analytics, owned by Verizon Media, sees app usage on 1 million mobile applications across all major app categories, with a broad cohort of news applications. For this analysis, we measure daily app sessions in the United States. Included in our app sample is a broad set of news apps that cover politics, international relations, and current events. We removed any apps that cover entertainment news. Let’s take a look.

In the above graph, we chart daily news app sessions for the first six months of both 2019 and 2020. 2019 is displayed in light blue, and 2020 in dark blue. We divide the year-to-date into three periods: Politics, Coronavirus and Protests.

The months from January to early March 2020 were marked by a number of news spikes that exceeded news app consumption during the same period in 2019. These included a conflict between the United States and Iran, as well as the first Democratic Presidential Primary races. Additionally, news of Kobe Bryant’s death dominated the news in the last week of January. Despite these spikes, the average number of daily news sessions during this period increased only by 3% compared to the same time period in 2019.

Beginning in March, corresponding with the rapid rise in COVID-19 cases, we observe that news consumption steps up considerably. COVID-19 headlines peaked in mid-March as states began issuing stay-at-home orders. Schools closed, companies asked employees to work from home and national sports leagues shut down. Unemployment rates climbed and the stock market experienced historical volatility. During this period, news consumption surged by 44% relative to the same period in 2019. We believe that the scope and severity of COVID-19, combined with an increase in overall app activity —as people found themselves at home with more time to fill— contributed to elevated news app usage.

2020 news app consumption outpaced that of 2019 from March through May, but with a steady taper down. Beginning in late May, however, consumption surged again on the news of George Floyd’s death, sparking nationwide protests regarding Black Lives Matter and social injustice. During this period, the average number of daily news app sessions grew by 42% compared to the same period last year.

As we write this report, we are at the halfway point of 2020. The protests over the social injustices continue in many cities nationwide and COVID-19 cases continue to rise. Plus, with an upcoming U.S. Presidential Election on November 3rd, we do not anticipate news consumption to wane anytime soon. We’ll continue to monitor interesting mobile trends and keep you informed.