data.ai unveils its annual Top Publisher Awards. Top 50 Publishers by global consumer spend ranking contained 17 publishers from the Americas region, 27 from Asia Pacific, and 6 from Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA). 

Top 30 APAC Headquartered Publishers by Worldwide Consumer Spend
Top 50 Overall Publishers Worldwide by Consumer Spend
Top 30 AMER Headquartered Publishers by Worldwide Consumer Spend

Top 50 Overall Publishers Worldwide

In 2022, time spent on mobile increased to 5 hours per day, of which entertainment accounted for 70%. Short-Form Video apps, led by TikTok, dominated consumer share of wallet. To maximize monetization within their apps, the top publishers in 2022 adopted hybrid strategies through a combination of one-time purchases and recurring subscriptions. In 2022, 42 of the top 50 publishers found monetization success predominately through in-app purchases, and we expect this trend to continue. This is in comparison to 8 out of the top 50 publishers, which predominantly used a subscription strategy to monetize their suite of apps.

Tencent (#1) topped the charts for the sixth consecutive year, while ByteDance jumped five places to #2. This was primarily driven by the popularity of TikTok, which dominated consumer attention and drove record consumer spend in 2022 to the tune of $3.3 billion, doubling from 2021.  

Publishers such as Match Group (#6), Disney (#8), Bumble (#39), and Kakao piccoma Corp (#37) all saw growth as their apps kept consumers entertained. While market level spend on gaming was down in 2022, there were some notable successes at the publisher level. TakeTwo Interactive (#15), which acquired Zynga in May 2022, moved up an impressive 49 places largely driven by the success of Zynga’s hit titles such as Empires & Puzzles and Zynga Poker. Other gaming publishers that saw double-digit jumps include Dream Games (#42) and Top Games (#46), which saw success with games Royal Match and Evony, respectively.  

Top 30 mobile publishers from North and South America

Among the Top 30 Publishers HQ’d in the Americas (AMER) in 2022, the United States has the strongest representation with 28 publishers, while Brazil and Canada secured 1 position. Media & Entertainment-focused publishers make up more than one-third of the top 30 AMER-based publishers. Meanwhile, 13 of the publishers were primarily focused on mobile games — finding success in genres such as RPG, Match and Casino.

The winners of this year’s Top 30 Regional Publishers include: 

Top 30 Publishers across Asia Pacific by Consumer Spend

Among the Top 30 Publishers HQ’d in APAC, China has the most top publishers with 15, followed by Japan at 10. Game publishers that focus on RPG and Strategy Genres make up more than two-thirds of the Top 30 APAC-based Publishers. Outside of Gaming, mobile publishers in Asia Pacific also found success in other genres such as Book & Reference (Comics) and Entertainment Apps (Short Videos), fueled by manga comic apps and TikTok. 

Notable publishers across Asia Pacific that grew the most during 2022 and the top apps that contributed towards their success include: 

  • #7 NCSOFT, based in South Korea, moved up 4 ranks compared to the previous year, with the 5th installment of its Lineage series, Lineage W, a MMORPG (RPG) game launching in late 2021 and experiencing a tidal wave of revenue growth in 2022 at 362% year-over-year.
  • #27 G-bits, based in China, moved up 9 ranks compared to the previous year, with YiNianXiaoYao, a Idle RPG (RPG) app having the biggest revenue growth within its portfolio of apps at 25% year-over-year.
  • #10 SoftBank, based in Japan, moved up 3 ranks year over year, driven by the longstanding local favorite, LINE Manga, a 10-year-old comic app that sustained 21% growth in consumer spend year over year from a dedicated fanbase. Another boost for Softbank was the release of Undecember in October 2022, an Action RPG (RPG) game popular in South Korea and the US. 

For a complete list of winners in other categories for data.ai’s Top Publishers Awards 2023, click here.

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