In 2026 so far, 16,284 apps with “AI” in the name were released on Google Play. In 2022 the number was 582.
That is a 28-fold increase in four years. But the more useful number is the share, because Google Play grew too.
AI apps went from 1 in every 350 new releases to 1 in every 31.
These figures come from our own scrape of 3,037,501 Google Play listings. Here is the full picture, including the part nobody publishes: whether any of these apps actually get used.
How many AI apps launch on Google Play each year?
Counting by first release date, across our corpus:
| Year | All new releases | With “AI” in the name | Share | Roughly |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 203,635 | 582 | 0.29% | 1 in 350 |
| 2023 | 252,564 | 2,055 | 0.81% | 1 in 123 |
| 2024 | 260,003 | 2,925 | 1.12% | 1 in 89 |
| 2025 | 399,738 | 8,920 | 2.23% | 1 in 45 |
| 2026 | 499,548 | 16,284 | 3.26% | 1 in 31 |
2026 is a partial year. The count already exceeds all of 2025 with months still to run.
Note what happens if you only read the left column. Total releases grew 2.5 times between 2022 and 2026, so some of the AI growth is just more apps in general. Strip that out and the share still rose 11.4 times. The trend is real, and it is smaller than the raw 28x suggests.
Which categories are the AI apps in?
Productivity has the highest concentration. In 2026, 7.1% of every new Productivity app has AI in the name.
| Category | AI apps released 2026 | Share of that category’s 2026 releases |
|---|---|---|
| Productivity | 2,514 | 7.1% |
| Entertainment | 1,181 | 6.0% |
| Health & Fitness | 1,520 | 5.3% |
| Lifestyle | 1,412 | 4.5% |
| Education | 1,745 | 4.4% |
| Finance | 661 | 3.4% |
| Tools | 1,759 | 3.3% |
| Business | 810 | 2.2% |
Photography and Art & Design also produced large numbers, 932 and 523, though those two categories fell outside the sample we captured denominators for, so we are not quoting a share for them.
Do AI apps actually get downloads?
This is the part that changes the story.
The median AI app has 345 installs. The median app without AI in the name has 304. Putting AI in your title is associated with about forty extra installs at the midpoint, which is to say nothing at all.
More telling: 35.4% of AI apps have fewer than 100 installs. Over a third never found a hundred people.
And 82.6% of AI apps do not have enough ratings for Google Play to display a score. That is 30,029 of 36,344 apps. Not badly rated. Simply not rated, because too few people ever used them.
Where scores do exist, AI apps sit slightly lower: a median of 4.15 against 4.23 for everything else.
How are AI apps making money?
Almost all of them are free to install. 98.5% carry no upfront price.
The money is behind the install. 53.8% offer in-app purchases and 38.7% contain ads.
A free download with a subscription behind the first screen is the default shape of an AI app in 2026. That matters for anyone building one, because it means you are not competing on price. You are competing on whether someone trusts you enough to reach the paywall.
Is this just app farms churning out clones?
Less than you would expect, and this surprised us.
The 36,344 AI apps come from 28,189 different developers. Only 3.9% come from developers with ten or more AI apps. The largest single AI portfolio we found is 120 apps.
Compare that with the store overall, where a small number of high-volume publishers account for a far larger share of listings. The AI wave is mostly individuals and small teams, one or two apps each, not industrial cloning.
That is worth saying plainly because the easy assumption is the opposite.
What this means if you are launching an app now
Three things follow from the numbers.
The word “AI” in your title is not a growth strategy. Median installs are effectively identical. Whatever advantage existed when 1 in 350 apps claimed AI has been competed away now that it is 1 in 31.
Your competition at launch is much heavier than it was. 499,548 apps were released in 2026 against 203,635 in 2022. More apps chasing the same attention.
Most apps never reach a hundred users. That is the real base rate, and it is why what happens before launch matters more than the name on the listing.
Our analysis of what happened to the size of Google Play covers the wider contraction this sits inside.
Frequently asked questions
How many AI apps are on Google Play?
We identified 36,344 apps with AI as a standalone word in the title across a corpus of 3,037,501 listings. 16,284 of those were released in 2026 alone.
How fast is the number of AI apps growing?
Releases with AI in the name rose from 582 in 2022 to 16,284 in 2026, a 28-fold increase. As a share of all new releases it went from 0.29% to 3.26%, an 11.4-fold rise.
Which app category has the most AI apps?
By share, Productivity leads: 7.1% of new Productivity apps in 2026 have AI in the name. Entertainment follows at 6.0% and Health and Fitness at 5.3%.
Do AI apps get more downloads than other apps?
No. The median AI app has 345 installs against 304 for apps without AI in the name. More than a third of AI apps have fewer than 100 installs.
Are AI apps rated worse than other apps?
Slightly, where a rating exists at all. The median score is 4.15 against 4.23. The larger finding is that 82.6% of AI apps have too few ratings to display a score.
Are most AI apps made by app farms?
No. The 36,344 AI apps come from 28,189 developers, and only 3.9% come from developers with ten or more AI apps. The wave is mostly individuals and small teams.
Does putting AI in my app name help it rank?
Our data cannot answer ranking directly, and it shows no install advantage. With 1 in 31 new apps using the term, it is now a crowded description rather than a distinguishing one.
Before you launch into that crowd
Option 1: verified testers assigned to you
- Starter, $15 gives you 15 verified Android testers for the full 14 days.
- Pro, $25 gives you 25 testers, plus a detailed ASO report and priority support.
- Testers assigned within 6 hours, so your 14 days start today rather than after a week of asking.
- They open your app daily and stay active for the full period.
- Anyone who goes inactive is replaced.
- A feedback report at the end, plus pre-filled answers for the 10 production access questions.
- 100% production access or your money back.
More than 10,000 apps have reached production this way. Submit your app to start.
Option 2: join a free Pack of 16
If you would rather trade time than money, the Testers Community app puts you in a pack of 16 developers. Everyone tests each other’s apps for 16 days, opening every app daily and leaving feedback. Inactive members get replaced.
Either way, read the full requirements before you begin, and our guide to why production access gets refused so the record you build is one Google can approve.
Sources
- Testers Community Play Store corpus, 3,037,501 listings captured 2026. Counts of “AI” as a standalone word in the app title, by first release year.
- Google Play Console Help: App testing requirements for new personal developer accounts
