When we think about augmented reality games, Pokemon GO comes first. Its always been one of the most grossing games and it made more than one million a day on iOS. Today, Sensor Tower intelligence data reveals that the game surpassed $3.6 billion in global player spending. Pokemon GO launched on the 6th of July 2016, this milestone comes with the game’s fourth anniversary.
Pokemon GO is still leading the genre
It is still the leader in location-based gaming due to the IP and its ideal fit to the genre. Square Enix’s Dragon Quest Walk is trying to overcome it in Japan. The title generated $540 million in player spending since it came out back in September 2019. There’s also Ludia’s Jurassic World Alive which made $76.5 million. Tencent’s Let’s Hunt Monsters is also challenging other titles in the genre. It generated about $70 million on iOS alone in China. However, there is no other game that can compete with Pokemon GO in terms of worldwide appeal. Below you can see the revenue the game accumulated for in the first half of each year.
Games usually generate less after many years of the release but that’s not the case for Pokemon GO. As you can see in the graph above, each year the game generated more and more. Last year, Niantic‘s hit title made $905 million globally. In the year before, 2018, the game generated an estimated $832.5 million in just six months following its July release.
Most revenue is from the United States
The U.S accounted for 35.4 percent of player spending with $1.3 billion. Japan and Germany follow respectively. When it comes to platforms, the majority of the revenue was from Google Play, $1.9 billion while on the App Store, the game generated close to $1.7 billion. By the time of writing, total unique downloads are 577 million globally. Although we were (and still) in a pandemic, Pokemon GO is still climbing the revenue charts.
