A new report released today by App Annie delves into how Gen Z consumers interact with their smartphones and mobile apps. According to data collected in Q3 2020, Gen Z users spend an average of over 4.1 hours per month on non-gaming apps, or 10% more than previous demographics. They also interact with apps more often, with 20% more sessions per user in non-game apps, at 120 sessions per month per app, compared to older groups.
This app engagement data is just a glimpse of Generation Z trends, but it is an incomplete analysis, as it focuses on select markets only, including US, UK, Brazil, France, Germany, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico , South Korea and Turkey. It also only included data collected from Android devices, which does not provide a complete picture.
The Annie app found that Generation Z are more likely to play games than older users, but they don't log into them often or use them for longer. Those aged 25 and over actually spent nearly 20% more on their most used games and accessed 10% more frequently. Both demographics spent more total time on gaming than using non-gaming apps, on a monthly basis.
A breakthrough in the category of games for Gen Z users, however, was the casual arcade game Among Us!, Which has just become the third most played game in the world, thanks to its team-based multiplayer features and wave of Twitch flows. When Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez played on Twitch last night, it became one of the largest Twitch streams ever, peaking at 435,000 concurrent viewers.
Other popular Gen Z games include Match-3 games like Candy Crush Saga and Toon Blast, action games like PUBG Mobile and Free Fire, and casual simulation games like Minecraft Pocket Edition and Roblox.
The report also looked at Gen Z users' favorite apps across a range of non-gaming categories on iOS and Android.
Tic knock and Snapchat, in particular, stood out as Gen Z's top over-indexed social and communications apps in nine of the 10 markets analyzed for this report. This comes in the wake of Snap's extraordinary earnings yesterday, where the social app surpassed analysts' expectations and saw daily user growth climb 4% to 238 million.
Discord is also seeing strong growth, particularly in France, as mobile and remote gaming became an epicenter of social interactions during the pandemic.
Of the entertainment apps, Twitch was the best over-indexed app in six of the 10 markets for Gen Z users, although niconico live streaming was popular in Japan.
App Annie found that finance and shopping apps have not yet reached a large Gen Z audience, but they are showing promising growth.
Few financial apps outperform indexing with Gen Z, although the demographic tends to interact with non-banking fintech apps like Venmo. Monzo and DANA. In South Korea, one of the best apps has been the peer-to-peer payment app Toss, which also offers loans, insurance and credit.
Top Gen Z fashion apps, meanwhile, included Shein, ASOS, Shopee, and Mercari.
Overall, Gen Z active users are growing faster in the markets analyzed than older groups, with emerging markets like Indonesia and Brazil experiencing the strongest growth.
App Annie noted that Gen Z is becoming one of the most powerful consumer segments on mobile, as 98% own a smartphone and have a combined estimated spending power of $ 143 billion annually.
"Gen Z has never known a world without their smartphone. They see the world through this first mobile lens, "Ted Krantz, CEO of App Annie, said in a statement on the report's findings.