【Ongoing Series Archives】

The Ongoing Series Archivesglobal app economy is expected to more than quadruple in size within the next four years.

That's according to a report released this week from research firm App Annie, which estimates the current $1.3 trillion market could grow to a whopping $6.3 trillion by 2021.

That value encompasses advertising, in-app transactions, and other forms of mobile commerce as well as sales of the apps themselves.

SEE ALSO: The mobile online shopping revolution is definitely coming—but nobody's sure when

Meanwhile, the number of app users worldwide will double to 6.3 billion, researchers predict, suggesting that business opportunities to squeeze maximum cash from each app user are far from fully realized.

Indeed, App Annie estimates that the average mobile user currently spends around $379 on apps each year—a figure that includes the monetary worth of attention paid to ads. By 2021, that amount is expected to swell to $1,008.

Maybe that's because the total time we spend in mobile apps is expected to pass 3.5 trillionhours by that year.

The biggest driver of this growth will come in the form of an explosion in mobile online shopping and other in-app commerce. While the category is growing fast and industry experts have talked of a smartphone commerce revolution for years, people still tend to do the vast majority of their shopping on desktop.

But that reality is changing fast as companies find new ways to make navigating small screens easier and assure customers that their money is safe on their phone.

Mashable Light Speed Want more out-of-this world tech, space and science stories? Sign up for Mashable's weekly Light Speed newsletter. By clicking Sign Me Up, you confirm you are 16+ and agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Thanks for signing up!

"Clearly, commerce is the dominant portion of these numbers. As mobile payments become more widely integrated in apps and adopted by consumers, retail, ride hailing, grocery, travel, and many more, industries will drive (or get left out) of this transition," said Danielle Levitas, senior vice president of Research and Professional Services at App Annie. 

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

Advertising will also be a major driver as ad tech companies find more efficient and less annoying ad formats and more precise ways of tracking and targeting ads.

Beyond that, growth will be further fueled as the mobile revolution begins to hit perviously untapped new industries.

"We haven’t even started to see the impact of mobile and apps in other areas, like health, so there is even more upside long term," Levitas said.    

The growth is expected to be slanted towards developing markets where it's often easier to roll out mobile technologies on a large scale because there isn't as much established infrastructure to stand in their way. That's consistent with trends in mobile payments, commerce, and social media, among other things.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

App Annie uses an algorithm to forecast the app marketplace, pulling data from more than 30,000  economic, demographic, behavioral, and technology sector-specific sources, including the U.S Census Bureau and the European Central Bank.

As for how we're spending our time, App Annie highlighted gains in a few categories. Travel app usage went up as much as 75 percent in many countries. Gaming, long one of the most dominant categories, also saw gains — particularly in Japan and South Korea where "hardcore mobile gamers" (defined as the top 10 percent of most active gamers by App Annie) are spending nearly three hours a day playing games. 

Other notable stats: The U.S. was the leader in app creation in 2016, with new Google Play and iOS apps making up 24 percent of the total app releases. China came in second with 15 percent of the world's new apps, followed by 9 percent from Japan, 7 percent from Germany, and 6 percent coming out of South Korea. 

Here's to a future of even more time and money spent on apps. 

---

Featured Video For You

---

Turn your dog into a disco ball with this light up vest

---

Topics Apps & Software

• Games
• Shopping
• Tech
• Science
• Life
• Social Good
• Digital Culture
• Deals

• Draper vs. Arnaldi 2025 livestream: Watch Madrid Open for free
• A New Museum Memorializes the Commercial World’s Biggest Failures
• Staff Picks: David Grossman, Donald Barthelme, Derren Brown, and More
• Soviet Women Soldiers of World War II
• Turtle Beach Recon 50P gaming headset deal: 28% off
• From Vienna with Love (And Other Mixed Emotions)
• Meeting Sam Shepard at a Friend’s House on Eighth Avenue
• Voyage in the Dark by Brian Cullman
• I'm a college professor. My advice to young people who feel hooked on tech
• Inside the Issue: Behind “No Home Go Home / Go Home No Home”

• My Year of Finance Boys by Daniel Lefferts
• 5 reasons Apple Vision Pro will be the hottest new travel accessory
• Amazon launches AI shopping assistant called...Rufus?
• Good Manners by Hebe Uhart
• Hands by Gil Cuadros
• Google Maps: It's getting a new generative AI feature
• Prince and the Afterworld: Dorothea Lasky and Tony Tulathimutte Recommend by The Paris Review
• Catherine O'Hara is in talks to join 'The Last of Us' Season 2
• Cooking with Franz Kafka by Valerie Stivers
• Recommended Readings for Students by Yu Hua

• 'The Last of Us' Season 2, episode 3's opening credits has a heartbreaking change
• Interview with the Neanderthal
• Soviet Women Soldiers of World War II
• What to Do When Your Patron Is a Multinational Corporation
• What's Thermal Throttling and How to Prevent It
• A Letter from Sam Shepard to Johnny Dark
• Skiffle Craze: An Interview with Billy Bragg
• It’s Time to Get in Touch with Your Inner Grotesque
• A worthless juicer and a Gipper-branded server
• Can AI Write Pop Songs? On Music and Machine Language

• Best IPL deal: Save $80 on Braun IPL Silk·Expert
• When “Caca
• Deborah Turbeville’s Anti
• Interview with the Neanderthal
• 'The Last of Us' Season 2, episode 3's opening credits has a heartbreaking change
• Creek Theses: New Notes on Dawson’s Creek
• Staff Picks: Renee Gladman, Carol Rama, and Ocean Mythology
• It’s Never a Bad Time to Brush Up on Your Demonology
• Boeing's new VR simulator immerses astronauts in space training
• The Great Nadar: Mementos from a Famous French Photographer