Global market intelligence firm Sensor Tower on Jan. 28 released a report analysing key factors behind the recovery in the mobile games market.

The report estimates global mobile game revenue reached $82 billion in 2025. The in-app purchase market has entered a recovery phase again after a post-pandemic adjustment following rapid growth during the pandemic.

Downloads are stabilising at more than 50 billion a year. As the market enters a mature stage, game companies are focusing on extending game lifecycles rather than simply increasing downloads. In particular, a LiveOps strategy that provides ongoing content updates and events even after launch has emerged as a key driver of growth.

Revenue growth was concentrated in a small number of genres and top titles. Among games whose annual revenue increase exceeded $50 million last year, the strategy genre accounted for close to half of total growth.

In particular, Last War: Survival and Whiteout Survival are assessed to have achieved annual revenue of $2.4 billion and $2.2 billion, respectively, last year. They showed an advantage in operational capabilities that secure high-spending users and generate revenue by providing ongoing content to enjoy.

Sensor Tower cited sophisticated operational strategies as the success factor for top games. It divided them into three types: regular events, themed events and long-term events.

Regular events are a basic structure that encourages player logins, while themed events present new goals on a weekly basis to raise engagement. Long-term events draw participation from top-tier users through large-scale competitive structures and top-level rewards.

Whiteout Survival drove revenue growth through its Halloween event. Monopoly Go also expanded user participation through an update collaborating with the Star Wars intellectual property. Gossip Harbor succeeded in rebounding revenue by adding connected content such as a season pass.