Developer Niantic is this month celebrating the five-year anniversary of its mega-popular smash-hit mobile game, Pokemon GO, and the company has particular reason to feel jubilant beyond the mere milestone: Pokemon GO’s lifetime revenue has now exceeded a whopping $5 billion, according to data analysts Sensor Tower.
A new report highlights its success in comparison to other AR, location-based mobile games — a genre that Pokemon GO more or less gave birth to and remains the clear leader. The game has so far earned $641.6 million in the first half of 2021, ahead of competition such as Dragon Quest Walk, which has accumulated $261 million.
As you can see the graph above, H1 2021 is also Pokemon GO’s best-ever start to a year, with revenue up 34 percent from H1 2020 and up 130 percent from H1 2017. 2020 was the game’s best year to date with $1.4 billion in revenue accumulated; Pokemon GO is already well on its way to matching or bettering that tally in 2021.
Other key pickouts from Sensor Tower’s report include the following:
- The US is highest revenue-generating country, accumulating $1.9 billion, or 36.6 percent of its lifetime player spending in the country. Japan is number 2 with 32 percent.
- Google Play accounts for the majority of player spending, accumulating $2.7 billion, or 52.8 percent, while the App Store has picked up $2.4 billion, or 47.2 percent.
- To date, Pokémon GO has picked up approximately 632 million downloads. The U.S. ranks No. 1 for installs, generating 115.5 million downloads, or 18.3 percent of the total. Brazil ranks No. 2 for installs, while India rounds out the top three.
- Google Play has taken the lion’s share of downloads, racking up approximately 487 million installs, or around 77 percent. The App Store, meanwhile, has generated 144.8 million downloads, or approximately 23 percent of the total.
Sensor Tower’s own support commentary cites Pokemon GO’s regular string of updates as central to its success. Also, despite stay-at-home measures during COVID-19 hampering located-based games, developer Niantic was successful in keeping players interested in the game via new modes of play.
