India is starting to pay for apps, not just download them

For years, India was the world’s largest app download market but one of its toughest places to make money. That is beginning to change as Indian consumers spend more on AI, entertainment, and other premium apps.

India’s mobile app market generated a record $345 million in consumer spending during the second quarter of this year, up 35% from a year earlier, according to a new report by Sensor Tower. The app-market intelligence firm said the gains were increasingly driven by generative AI, streaming, and productivity apps rather than gaming, as Indian consumers became more willing to pay for digital subscriptions.

The record quarter builds on a broader trend of rising app monetization. India’s revenue per download has more than doubled over the past three-and-a-half years, while quarterly app downloads have remained at around 6.3 billion since 2023.

“We would describe India today as a rapidly evolving mobile market with a large user base and growing willingness to pay for digital services,” Eve Chen, an insights analyst at Sensor Tower, told TechCrunch.

Chen attributed the change to the wider adoption of digital payments, including India’s Unified Payments Interface (a system that lets people pay directly from their bank accounts) and digital wallets, which have reduced friction for in-app purchases, alongside growing acceptance of app-based subscriptions and premium digital services.

The trend also stands out globally. India’s app revenue saw its fastest growth in Q2 among major app markets, generating more than $200 million in quarterly consumer spending, per Sensor Tower’s data shared with TechCrunch. In contrast, Mexico grew 30% and Turkey 25%, while U.S. app revenue actually declined 3% over the same period.

“These figures suggest that India is no longer just the world’s largest market by downloads, but is also emerging as one of the fastest-growing markets for app monetization,” Chen told TechCrunch.

India still trails more mature app markets by a wide margin. Revenue per download stands at about $4.60 in the U.S., $3.90 in South Korea, and $6.10 in Japan, compared with a small fraction of that in India. Nonetheless, Chen said the trajectory matters more than the absolute level, with India’s steadily improving monetization suggesting significant room for long-term growth.

Generative AI has emerged as one of the fastest-growing segments, with OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude together accounting for nearly 83% of India’s AI app revenue in Q2, according to Sensor Tower’s data shared with TechCrunch.