AI apps & short-form dramas drive new mobile growth trends

Mintegral has released new data indicating three key trends that are set to reshape growth in the mobile sector through to the end of 2025.

The findings highlight the widespread adoption of consumer AI applications, a significant increase in short-form drama content originating from the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region, and growing opportunities for advertisers through third-party Android stores, which are also referred to as "blue-ocean" channels for acquiring users at lower costs.

AI apps become mainstream

According to Mintegral, the use of AI applications on consumer devices has reached mass-market levels. The category recorded 1.5 billion downloads and generated USD $1.3 billion in revenue during 2024. AI chatbots experienced the most rapid growth, with a 119% year-on-year increase, while AI art generators continued to expand with 21% year-on-year growth.

The data further reveals that 16 generative-AI applications exceeded USD $10 million in in-app purchase (IAP) revenue, and 25 applications recorded over 10 million downloads, reflecting a high level of consumer willingness to pay for AI-supported services aimed at productivity, creativity, and utility.

Mintegral's analysis notes:

AI is no longer a novelty; it's a durable consumer habit. Developers building pragmatic AI features around pain points (productivity, finance, PDF/chat, community) are winning traction, and advertisers are finding conversion-ready audiences at scale.

Short-form drama's global reach

Mintegral's data shows that mobile applications focused on short-form, episodic drama-often described as "short-drama"-have experienced quarterly growth rates of 50% to 200% since the third quarter of 2023.

This entertainment segment relies predominantly on advertising for monetisation, with 90% of income attributed to in-app advertising (IAA), and the remaining 10% coming from IAP methods such as subscriptions and token-based purchases.

Indonesia leads with a 39% share of global downloads for these apps, followed by Brazil, the Philippines, Thailand, Mexico, and the combined markets of Japan and Korea. This suggests a rapid cross-regional adoption and appeal for low customer acquisition cost (CAC) entertainment content.

The guidance provided explains:

A new mobile entertainment category born in APAC is exporting globally, and advertisers are meeting audiences where they binge micro-episodes. Rewarded video entry points like daily check-ins, unlocking new episodes, and task rewards are standard, giving performance marketers clear levers to balance reach and retention.

Third-party Android stores as new growth channels

The report details the increasing relevance of third-party Android stores outside of the dominant Google Play and App Store platforms. These channels, including those operated by Xiaomi, Amazon, Samsung, Oppo/Vivo, Huawei, and several in Eastern Europe, are described as relatively untapped reservoirs of advertising inventory.

Mintegral highlights that its self-serve platform and software development kit integrations enable advertisers to effectively target and monetise users on these channels, often achieving lower costs per install (CPI) and rapid scaling.

Case studies from Amazon's app store, for instance, show US CPI ranges between USD $0.26 and USD $0.42 with daily install numbers spanning from 2,000 to 5,000, subject to the specific app genre and bidding model.

Mintegral states:

Marketers don't need to be "small fish" fighting in red-ocean auctions. Third-party stores are expanding reach and smoothing supply shocks, especially for gaming, utilities, entertainment, and emerging short-drama publishers.

Advertiser guidance

Mintegral's recommendations for advertisers focus on aligning bidding strategies with return-on-ad-spend (ROAS) targets, leveraging automation in creative production and analysis, and incorporating third-party stores into media plans to access cheaper and scalable user growth.

Specifically, the guidance is to implement ROAS-focused bidding frameworks such as Target ROAS, Hybrid ROAS, and IAA ROAS, or to base campaigns on cost per engagement (CPE) metrics. Advertisers are also encouraged to use creative automation tools, including dynamic creative optimisation and playable advertisements, for rapid iteration on both short-drama and AI utility formats.

Mintegral further suggests that diversifying distribution to include third-party Android stores can help unlock incremental scale and allow advertisers to refine campaigns by whitelisting successful verticals and sub-channels.

Platform scale

Mintegral states that its own platform currently provides user acquisition and monetisation support to more than 100,000 applications, processing in excess of 300 billion ad requests and delivering 1.2 billion impressions each day across categories such as gaming, utilities, entertainment, finance, and education.