More apps launched on Google Play in 2026 than in any year before it. Almost none of them found users.
Those two facts sit side by side in our data, and together they describe the app market better than any single number does.
We analysed 3,037,501 public Google Play listings to work out what is actually happening: how many apps launch, how many downloads they get, how they make money, and how many are quietly abandoned.
How many apps launch on Google Play now?
More every year, and the curve is getting steeper.
Releases went from 203,635 in 2022 to 499,548 in 2026, and 2026 is only about seven months of data. That is roughly two and a half times more apps competing for the same attention.
The clearest driver is that building an app got cheap. AI tools mean a working app can be assembled in a weekend by someone who could not have built one at all three years ago. Our own count of apps with “AI” in the name went from 0.29% of releases in 2022 to 3.26% in 2026, which we broke down in our AI apps report.
How many downloads does a normal app get?
Far fewer than most people expect. This is the number we get asked about most often, and the answer surprises nearly everyone.
The middle app gets 305 downloads. Not 305,000. Three hundred and five.
More than a third never reach 100 downloads at all. Almost two thirds never reach 1,000. Only 2.2% ever pass a million.
We use the middle app rather than an average on purpose. A handful of apps like YouTube have billions of installs, and an average would let those few drag the number up until it described nobody.
The number that says the most
If we could show a developer only one figure from this dataset, it would be this one.
Only 12.2% of apps on Google Play have a star rating at all.
A rating appears once enough people review an app. Nearly nine in ten apps never reach that point. They are not rated badly. They were never used enough to be rated.
That matches what we see from the other side of the business. Developers come to us after a rejection, and the pattern is almost always the same: the app worked, the listing was fine, and nobody ever opened it.
How do apps make money in 2026?
Almost nobody charges upfront any more.
97.4% of apps are free to download. Paid-upfront apps are down to 2.6%, which effectively makes them a rounding error.
The money moved behind the install: 27.3% carry ads and 11.4% offer in-app purchases. Worth noting that these vary sharply by category. AI apps, for instance, offer in-app purchases at 53.8%, roughly five times the store average.
How many apps are abandoned?
A large minority, and this is where opinions differ.
320,076 apps, 10.5% of those we analysed, have not been updated since 2023.
There are two fair ways to read that. One view is that this is healthy: hobby projects end, the store keeps the listing, no harm done. The other is that an app nobody has touched in three years is a security and compatibility risk sitting in a store people trust.
Both readings are defensible from this data alone. What we can say is that Google appears to share the second concern: the store shrank considerably between 2024 and 2026 as it removed low-quality and outdated listings, which we covered in our report on the shrinking Play Store.
What we cannot tell you from this data
Being straight about the limits matters more than the findings, so here they are.
- This is our dataset, not the whole store. Google does not publish a total app count, so every percentage above is a share of the 3,037,501 listings we analysed, not of Google Play.
- We cannot measure search ranking. Nothing here says which apps rank where, because the data holds no ranking field.
- We cannot see revenue. We know an app has in-app purchases. We do not know whether anyone buys them.
- These are associations, not causes. Apps with more downloads tend to have better listings, but a good listing may be a symptom of a serious team rather than the reason for the downloads.
- Recent weeks are under-counted. A listing has to exist before a crawl can find it, so we draw no conclusions about month-to-month direction.
What this means if you are shipping an app
Three things follow, and they are not the usual advice.
Assume obscurity is the default. 87.8% of apps never get a rating. That is the base rate you are launching into, and it has nothing to do with how good your app is.
Free is the price. At 97.4% free, charging upfront removes you from consideration for most users before they read a word.
Real usage before launch is the one thing you control. The apps that survive are the ones that met real users early enough to fix what those users hit. Everything above describes a market where nobody finds you by accident.
Frequently asked questions
How many apps are released on Google Play each year?
Of the 3,037,501 listings we analysed, 499,548 apps were first released during 2026, up from 203,635 in 2022. Google does not publish an official figure.
How many downloads does the average app get?
The middle app gets 305 downloads. We use the middle app rather than the average, because a few enormous apps would distort an average. More than a third of apps never reach 100 downloads.
What percentage of apps have a rating?
Only 12.2%. The rest never get enough reviews for Google Play to show a star rating.
Are most apps free?
Yes. 97.4% are free to download. Only 2.6% charge upfront. Of the free ones, 27.3% carry ads and 11.4% offer in-app purchases.
How many Google Play apps are abandoned?
320,076 apps, 10.5% of those we analysed, have not been updated since 2023. Whether that counts as abandoned depends on your definition, so we state the cutoff rather than the label.
Is it harder to launch an app now than it was?
By volume, yes. Roughly 2.5 times more apps launch each year than in 2022, while the share that find any users has not improved.
If getting real users in front of your app is the hard part
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.
If you are about to start a closed test, read the full requirements first, and our guide to why production access gets refused.
Sources and method
- Analysis of 3,037,501 public Google Play listings, 2026. Release year from each listing’s first release date, downloads from the reported install count, update recency from the last-updated date.
- Google Play Console Help: App testing requirements for new personal developer accounts
- Google: Keeping Google Play and Android app ecosystems safe in 2025 (19 February 2026)
