Global downloads of Korean apps reach 1.8 bil. in 2025: report

Global downloads of Korean mobile apps on the Google Play Store last year were more than double the number of installments made locally, an industry report showed Wednesday. Global downloads of Korean apps reached 1.8 billion in 2025, some 2.5 times higher than the 730 million tallied domestically, according to a report published by the consulting agency Public First, cited by Google Korea. By country, India accounted for the most with 365 million installments, followed by Indonesia with 131 million and Brazil with 123 million. Google Play Store and the Android ecosystem generated $69 billion in revenue for Korea last year, the report also said. Korea has grown to host one of the biggest developer communities in the world, taking the No. 1 position in terms of the number of active developers in 2025, up by two ranks from a year earlier. The latest findings also showed that generative artificial intelligence (AI) can improve the productivity of app developers by 33 percent, with developers using Google's AI tools reducing their working hours by an average of 9.2 hours per week.