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4 of the Worlds Top 5 Most Downloaded Apps are Owned by Facebook
Rebecca Appleton • 17 December 2019
Worldwide app downloads hit a record high of 120 billion across iOS and Android in 2019, which represents a 5% year-over-year increase.
It’s funny to think that the modern day social media audience, despite still being heavy Facebook users, considers the brand to be old school and more akin to something their parents would use, given that the wider Facebook brand actually owns 4 of the 5 top downloaded apps for 2019.
Worldwide app downloads hit a record high of 120 billion across iOS and Android in 2019, which represents a 5% year-over-year increase. When we look at the top five most downloaded apps during that time this is what we get:
1. Facebook Messenger
2. Facebook
3. WhatsApp Messenger
4. TikTok
5. Instagram
It’s pretty astounding to think a single group brand has ownership of four out of five top apps like this in a single year, culminating in hundreds of millions of net downloads. But also, to consider the power that brings to the brand.
In a modern-day consumer centric world, where user data and behaviour is such a key to business success across pretty much every industry, the collective knowledge and consumer data gathered by Facebook overall is staggering. With the recent innovations in intra-app communications is easy to see how Facebook’s advertising programs are able to cross over and provide contextual and real time targeting based on the behaviour of their users.
For those who don’t follow this or haven’t been involved in digital advertising targeting like this, have you ever noticed how advertising seems to be just a little too coincidental these days? You were talking to your Dad on WhatsApp about how you needed to get your lawnmower fixed and suddenly FlyMo is hitting you with Facebook ads… The penny just dropped didn’t it?
Don’t worry, according to Mr Zuckerberg the entire process is completely automated and encrypted so that no data is ever shared outside of the machine learning system. It does still beg a wider moral question though, don’t you think?
TikTok the short video content social media platform is the only app in the top five which is not owned by parent group Facebook. TikTok was launched in China in 2016 under the brand name Douyin. The brand was relaunched the following year for markets outside of China as TikTok with a different network as to avoid the Chinese censorship restrictions.
The TikTok app has over 500million monthly active users and in Q1 of 2019 alone grew by over 180million downloads. Just outside of the top five are a few other apps you’d expect to see including Snapchat, Netflix and Spotify.
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