Increase in Mobile Game Downloads Due to the Spread of COVID-19
Weekly Domestic Game Downloads Increase by 35% Compared to Last Year's Average
[Asia Economy Reporter Jin-gyu Lee] Due to the spread of the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19), outdoor activities have decreased, resulting in an increase in the number of people enjoying mobile games in Korea and China.
Mobile data analytics platform App Annie announced on the 19th that the weekly game downloads in Korea during the last week of February increased by 35% compared to the previous year's average, recording over 15 million downloads.
Compared to January, the previous month, this represents a 25% increase. App Annie explained, "As people around the world are refraining from movement and working from home, the number of downloads and usage time of related apps are rapidly increasing."
In February alone, game downloads in China also surged by a remarkable 80% compared to last year's average. The weekly average game downloads on the iOS App Store in February reached 63 million, a 25% increase compared to January. App Annie predicted, "As recommendations to refrain from movement and maintain social distancing continue in the United States and European countries, patterns similar to those seen in Korea and China are expected to occur in other countries as well."
Along with this, there is also an increasing tendency to find entertainment by using social media apps to communicate with others. In China, TikTok users’ usage time in the first week of March recorded 3 billion hours, a 130% increase compared to the previous year's weekly average.
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On the other hand, usage of car-sharing apps, which involve face-to-face interaction, has declined. Analyzing ride-sharing app usage in six countries including Korea and the United States, it was found that the weekly downloads of China's ride-sharing app DiDi dropped by 75% from its peak, and the weekly downloads of France's BlaBlaCar app also fell by 65% from its peak.
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