84% of Indian smartphone owners have games on their phone: Report

TUNE has  released a report on mobile gaming trends, habits, purchases and behaviour patterns of mobile gamers in India. The report is called, “India & Mobile Gaming: Poised for Massive Growth” and comprises of data collected from over 3,500 smartphone owners in India. The report notes that in Q1 2016, the country witnessed double digit growth of mobile app installs in the gaming vertical. In fact 84% of Indian smartphone owners have games on their phone.  Further, 34% of Indian respondents admitted to spending money in mobile games every month. Women are also serious gamers in India with 87% playing a game at least one hour per week.

Read the complete press release below

TUNE, the Seattle based enterprise SaaS for mobile marketing company behind the products TUNE Marketing Console and HasOffers, today released a report on mobile gaming trends, gaming habits, purchases and behaviour patterns of the Indian mobile gamers. The report titled, ‘India & Mobile Gaming: Poised for Massive Growth’ comprises insights and data collected from over 3,500 Indian smartphone owners and over 220 million mobile app installs in India mapped from January-September 2016.

The report highlights the fast growing pace of mobile gaming in India. In the first quarter of 2016, TUNE witnessed significant double digit growth of mobile app installs in the gaming vertical. Combined with industry estimates this proves that mobile games in India are growing at an average rate of 56%. The report states that Indian gaming revenue is set to double in the next three years and hit INR 250 billion by 2019, owing its growth to the increase of smartphone penetration and higher in-app spending in the market.

As per the TUNE report, Indian mobile gamers are more likely to buy virtual goods. In fact, 34% of Indians respondents admitted to spending money in mobile games every month. Interestingly, a tiny fraction of players are the highest contributors to game revenue, just as it is seen in other markets globally. Specific to India, 2.5% of Indian gamers provide over half of game revenue, and 5% account for almost 80% of all game monetization in the country.

Ashwiny Thapliyal, Regional Head of Sales India said, “India is already the world’s second-biggest market for smartphones. With 221 million smartphone owners and as many as 800 million Indian citizens joining the smartphone revolution over the next decade, India will emerge as the country with biggest global opportunity for growth. India is a mobile-first country and its people are mobile-centric buyers. This is one of the many reasons why we furthered our existing commitment towards the Indian market by opening TUNE’s first corporate office in India located at Delhi/NCR in November 2016. Our India office will also serve as our strategic hub for business in Southeast Asia.”

Another key finding revealed that women are serious mobile gamers in India, with 87% playing a game at least one hour per week. This number matches the North American data, where women make up 55% of all mobile gamers. Of the women surveyed, 63% said that they prefer playing single player games and 18% prefer playing against another player. Interestingly, women prefer single-player games to an even greater extent than men.

John Koetsier, TUNE’s mobile economist added, “As per our research, the number of app installs in India doubled last year and in fact, Indians downloaded more than 3X as many commerce-oriented apps per capita as the next highest country, Brazil. Although relatively nascent, Indian mobile gaming industry is catching-up fast and our research highlights the immense potential it holds for gamers, game developers, mobile publishers and advertisers.”

Indian Gamers and their Gaming Habits

Game Download Trends

• 84% of Indian smartphone owners have games on their phones
• 37% of gamers have three or more games on their phones
• 47% of Indians in top urban cities like Delhi and Mumbai tend to install one to two games on their phone
• Indians are very eager to try new apps: a majority install new apps every week
• 90% of Indian smartphone owners download games regularly and are very willing to try new apps, especially new games
• Those with cheaper smartphones change to new games more frequently possibly due to low storage/device memory
• Google Play is the undisputed leader in India, taking 94% share of all game installs
• The cheaper the phone one possesses, the more likely is an Indian consumer to get new apps straight from a friend or from the web
• Almost 7% of people get new apps from their friends

Gaming Behaviour Trends

• Almost 9 in 10 Indian smartphone owners play games weekly
• 86% of people play at least one game regularly and almost a third play more than three games regularly
• Indians who own expensive smartphones worth 30K rupees and up are less likely to play games
• 57% of Indian mobile gamers prefer single-player games
• Only three of the top 10 downloaded games are team or multi-player games
• Indians are loyal gamers, with significantly higher user retention compared to global averages
• Almost a third of Indian gamers are exceptionally loyal to the games they love, at times playing them for months at stretch
• Just over one in 10 Indians play the same game regularly for over a year
• 50% of Indians give a game just a few days and switch to a new one, if it’s not interesting, fun, or engaging enough they switch to a new one

 Gender Matters

• Women play just as many games as men, but men play for longer
• 92% men play at least one hour per week as against 87% women who play at least one hour per week
• 57% of men play more than two hours each week, compared to 48% of women
• Interestingly, 54% men prefer single-player games
• Team games get the least attention from both Men (14%) and Women (11%)
• Young men i.e. teens under 17 play less than men aged 20 or above                        ·                      

Mobile Game Monetization and in-app Purchases

• Top games tend to be team or multiplayer games; 8 out of the top 10 grossing games in India are multiplayer or team games
• Similar to world average, 2.5% of Indian gamers provide over half of game revenue, and 5% account for almost 80% of all game monetization in the country
• Young gamers are the least likely to pay; 71% of Indian smartphone owners (under the age of 21) buy nothing in games every month
• 2% of gamers spend over INR 200 each month, and almost one in 10 spend over INR 50 every month
• 32% of gamers use digital wallet to cover their mobile game purchases, while 25% use a debit card as opposed to a credit card- widely use payment mode internationally