September 24, 2013 at 10:09Android vs iOS as an example of one game
Hello! My name is Pavel and I'm an indie developer .
I often read all sorts of analytics, there are a lot of graphs about how many Android devices are currently activated, how many iOS, how markets grow and shares fall. Unfortunately, percentages and abstract numbers rarely make it possible to understand exactly what is actually happening inside.
Most likely, I’m not the only one who encounters such a problem, so I decided to share the “live” statistics of one of my games, which has become quite popular on iOS and Android. Immediately make a reservation that the speech about the game is exclusively in Russian, respectively, only Russian-speaking users play it. For those who target Europe, USA, etc. post may be uninformative.
In March 2013, I posted the Word Composition game on Google Play. She did not offer some unprecedented gameplay. There were already 3 of them in Russian (and now there are even more of them). Nevertheless, thanks to some features, constant support and weekly updates, the game was able to become relatively popular. It was not possible to take the first place even in its category, the matter was limited to the fifth place in the Puzzles.
For a long time I only released games on Android, despite the fact that the framework is initially cross-platform and putting games in parallel and in Appstore is not so difficult. It was a matter of prejudice against iOS, and the lack of a Mac (in a compartment with a reluctance to spend money on it (and the virtual machine didn’t work normally on an AMD processor)). But at some point I overcame the “toad”, waited for a more or less adequate announcement on Avito, and bought a mac on the secondary market. So almost four months later, in July 2013, the Appstore launched its own version of “Compose the Word”. The games were absolutely identical, except for Android I continued to release weekly updates with a new content, and on iOS I limited myself to one all the time. This was not my first application for iOS, I already managed to feel two failures, despite the fact that on Google Play one of the games was quite popular. But “Compose the Words” was able to “fly up” in the top, simultaneously pulling my other game from the bottom, which I could not shoot on iOS by myself.
Well, now the numbers. We will compare statistics for 2 months. Those. for Google Play 03/15/2013 - 05/15/2013, and for the Appstore 07/11/2013 - 09/11/2013
In the first table, the best places in the top and places 60 days after launch in certain categories.
And a couple of graphs:
Android
iOS
As you can see from the tables, in iOS the game was able to climb to the very top, but over time, it turned out to be higher on Google Play. Perhaps the reason is the more frequent updates of the Android version, or maybe on iOS it is much easier to “push” the application to the top, so lingering on the top lines is much more difficult.
Here it’s worth mentioning that games on iOS can live in two thematic tops at once. The second at Compose the Word is Word Games. There, the position is still quite high - it fluctuates between first and third place. But they download from there a little, this is a low-profile hub.
Now more interesting - downloads :
Android:
iOS:
Despite the first place among all the games in the top, the maximum number of downloads per day on iOS slightly exceeded that on Google Play. At the same time, for the first month in the Appstore, 100 thousand more copies of the game were downloaded, and for the second Google Play not only played this hundred, but also went ahead with even more installations.
The graphs show that on iOS, rapid growth is followed by almost the same rapid decline, while Google Play rewards slow growth with an equally slow decrease in downloads.
It’s interesting to look at the ratings.. The table shows how the game was adopted on different devices. Because Since the time spent in stores is different, then for the first indicator we take the percentage of estimates of the total number, and in brackets are absolute values.
As you can see, Android users are much more tolerant and positively configured despite a whole bunch of problems that had to be solved for this system. Perhaps the level of requirements for the game is somewhat lower, or maybe something else, but the fact remains that the number of fives on Android is much higher. It is funny that the ratio of the number of ratings / number of installations for both systems is the same. Those. the desire to evaluate the game does not depend on the system, the convenience of using the market and anything else. In this regard, the users of both systems are the same.
Well, the most interesting thing is the loot .
Android:
iOS:
And here it’s just a rout. If in the previous indicators Android felt pretty confident and often won, then in the main thing - money, everything turned out to be very deplorable. Even for half a year of the game’s life, the version for Google Play earned less than the iOS version for the first month in the Appstore. The reason is simple and everyone knows it. Android users are very hungry for a freebie. Especially in Russia :) Coins are sold in the game for which you can buy answers (monetization is very soft, it’s quite easy to play without buying anything). Of course, there are a lot of ways to “wind” these coins on Android, and any player can do this. On iOS, this is not so trivial, which leads to just a huge gap in terms of earnings for these systems. Simple calculations show that for 1 download on Google Play in my game it costs $ 0.001 (10 times less than a cent), and on iOS, $ 0.005. Those. the average user on iOS spends 5 times more than the user on Google Play in Russia
Not so long ago, I realized that I was facing not quite that platform. I have to start paying more attention to iOS. Despite the fact that the percentage of iOS is falling, the total number of users continues to grow. And the developer needs something to eat :) And I'm not talking about the numerous problems that Android users have (the game from Google Play does not load, it does not update, it crashes, it hangs, etc.). Every day I get from 2 to 20 letters with problems from Android users and for the whole time that I publish games for iOS I received three letters from players from this system. Those. and much more time is spent on support (and you need to not just answer, but also find a reason, a solution, often unrelated to my application).
At the same time, I continue to use my Galaxy S I9000 three years ago and do not plan to leave Android.
I hope that this article will help someone in choosing the right development vector for him in the mobile market.
I often read all sorts of analytics, there are a lot of graphs about how many Android devices are currently activated, how many iOS, how markets grow and shares fall. Unfortunately, percentages and abstract numbers rarely make it possible to understand exactly what is actually happening inside.
Most likely, I’m not the only one who encounters such a problem, so I decided to share the “live” statistics of one of my games, which has become quite popular on iOS and Android. Immediately make a reservation that the speech about the game is exclusively in Russian, respectively, only Russian-speaking users play it. For those who target Europe, USA, etc. post may be uninformative.
In March 2013, I posted the Word Composition game on Google Play. She did not offer some unprecedented gameplay. There were already 3 of them in Russian (and now there are even more of them). Nevertheless, thanks to some features, constant support and weekly updates, the game was able to become relatively popular. It was not possible to take the first place even in its category, the matter was limited to the fifth place in the Puzzles.
For a long time I only released games on Android, despite the fact that the framework is initially cross-platform and putting games in parallel and in Appstore is not so difficult. It was a matter of prejudice against iOS, and the lack of a Mac (in a compartment with a reluctance to spend money on it (and the virtual machine didn’t work normally on an AMD processor)). But at some point I overcame the “toad”, waited for a more or less adequate announcement on Avito, and bought a mac on the secondary market. So almost four months later, in July 2013, the Appstore launched its own version of “Compose the Word”. The games were absolutely identical, except for Android I continued to release weekly updates with a new content, and on iOS I limited myself to one all the time. This was not my first application for iOS, I already managed to feel two failures, despite the fact that on Google Play one of the games was quite popular. But “Compose the Words” was able to “fly up” in the top, simultaneously pulling my other game from the bottom, which I could not shoot on iOS by myself.
Well, now the numbers. We will compare statistics for 2 months. Those. for Google Play 03/15/2013 - 05/15/2013, and for the Appstore 07/11/2013 - 09/11/2013
In the first table, the best places in the top and places 60 days after launch in certain categories.
| OS | Android | iOS |
| Top Puzzle | 5 | 1 |
| Puzzles in 60 days | 12 | 12 |
| Top Games | 22 | 1 |
| Top Games in 60 Days | 46 | fifty |
| Top Apps | 36 | 3 |
| Top Applications in 60 days | 76 | 168 |
And a couple of graphs:
Android
iOS
As you can see from the tables, in iOS the game was able to climb to the very top, but over time, it turned out to be higher on Google Play. Perhaps the reason is the more frequent updates of the Android version, or maybe on iOS it is much easier to “push” the application to the top, so lingering on the top lines is much more difficult.
Here it’s worth mentioning that games on iOS can live in two thematic tops at once. The second at Compose the Word is Word Games. There, the position is still quite high - it fluctuates between first and third place. But they download from there a little, this is a low-profile hub.
Now more interesting - downloads :
| OS | Android | iOS |
| Max per day | 15,828 | 20,397 |
| In just 30 days | 144,157 | 256,307 |
| In just 60 days | 460,683 | 328,256 |
| Total on 09/22/2013 | 880,168 | 343,207 |
Android:
iOS:
Despite the first place among all the games in the top, the maximum number of downloads per day on iOS slightly exceeded that on Google Play. At the same time, for the first month in the Appstore, 100 thousand more copies of the game were downloaded, and for the second Google Play not only played this hundred, but also went ahead with even more installations.
The graphs show that on iOS, rapid growth is followed by almost the same rapid decline, while Google Play rewards slow growth with an equally slow decrease in downloads.
It’s interesting to look at the ratings.. The table shows how the game was adopted on different devices. Because Since the time spent in stores is different, then for the first indicator we take the percentage of estimates of the total number, and in brackets are absolute values.
| OS | Android | iOS |
| Total number of ratings | 5856 | 2219 |
 | 84% (4930) | 75% (1657) |
| | 10% (583) | 12% (272) |
| | 3% (171) | 5% (115) |
| | 1% (50) | 2% (50) |
| | 2% (120) | 6% (125) |
As you can see, Android users are much more tolerant and positively configured despite a whole bunch of problems that had to be solved for this system. Perhaps the level of requirements for the game is somewhat lower, or maybe something else, but the fact remains that the number of fives on Android is much higher. It is funny that the ratio of the number of ratings / number of installations for both systems is the same. Those. the desire to evaluate the game does not depend on the system, the convenience of using the market and anything else. In this regard, the users of both systems are the same.
Well, the most interesting thing is the loot .
| OS | Android | iOS |
| Max per day | $ 26.23 | 90.04 $ |
| In just 30 days | 71.22 $ | $ 1,248.85 |
| In just 60 days | 319.58 $ | $ 1,792.39 |
| Total on 09/22/2013 | 1,120.15 $ | $ 1,888.99 |
Android:
iOS:
And here it’s just a rout. If in the previous indicators Android felt pretty confident and often won, then in the main thing - money, everything turned out to be very deplorable. Even for half a year of the game’s life, the version for Google Play earned less than the iOS version for the first month in the Appstore. The reason is simple and everyone knows it. Android users are very hungry for a freebie. Especially in Russia :) Coins are sold in the game for which you can buy answers (monetization is very soft, it’s quite easy to play without buying anything). Of course, there are a lot of ways to “wind” these coins on Android, and any player can do this. On iOS, this is not so trivial, which leads to just a huge gap in terms of earnings for these systems. Simple calculations show that for 1 download on Google Play in my game it costs $ 0.001 (10 times less than a cent), and on iOS, $ 0.005. Those. the average user on iOS spends 5 times more than the user on Google Play in Russia
Not so long ago, I realized that I was facing not quite that platform. I have to start paying more attention to iOS. Despite the fact that the percentage of iOS is falling, the total number of users continues to grow. And the developer needs something to eat :) And I'm not talking about the numerous problems that Android users have (the game from Google Play does not load, it does not update, it crashes, it hangs, etc.). Every day I get from 2 to 20 letters with problems from Android users and for the whole time that I publish games for iOS I received three letters from players from this system. Those. and much more time is spent on support (and you need to not just answer, but also find a reason, a solution, often unrelated to my application).
At the same time, I continue to use my Galaxy S I9000 three years ago and do not plan to leave Android.
I hope that this article will help someone in choosing the right development vector for him in the mobile market.