State of AI Apps Report 2025 is Live!
Mobile App Insights · Lucy Greider · October 2025
Inside the 2025 Middle East App Growth Report: Bidease x Sensor Tower
App marketers in the Middle East are rewriting the rules of mobile growth. With downloads and in-app purchase revenue soaring above global benchmarks, the 2025 Middle East App Growth Report reveals a market defined by agility, creativity, and rapid AI adoption.
The Middle East’s app economy isn’t just keeping pace with the world. It’s actually pulling ahead. Our 2025 Middle East App Growth Report, produced in partnership with Bidease, combines insights from 425 app marketers with Sensor Tower market data to unpack key trends impacting one of the fastest-growing mobile markets in the world.
Across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which comprises six Middle Eastern countries, downloads climbed 2.6% year-over-year (YoY) — compared to just 0.5% globally. In-app purchase (IAP) revenue grew even faster, jumping 20% YoY to reach $700 million. The UAE led the way, with a 26% surge in IAP revenue, and users across the region spent a cumulative 200 billion hours using apps in H1 2025. “With the rise in mobile-first businesses and super apps shifting consumer behavior in the GCC, it’s no surprise we’ve seen strong growth,” remarked Anthony Bartolacci, Chief Strategy Officer at Sensor Tower.
Marketers are keeping pace with this momentum through speed and efficiency. Nearly 80% of regional app marketers surveyed refresh their creatives weekly (or even more often), many aided by GenAI tools that help to automate and accelerate the creative process. Even so, more than half (52%) of marketers say that saturation is their top challenge. This pain point has led to increased adoption of programmatic buying and demand-side platforms (DSPs). As Shy Ramini, Managing Director, MENA at Bidease put it: “User acquisition remains the engine. Scale now comes from creative rigor, AI in the loop, and faster moves from test to insight to budget. The next edge is diversification.”
AI is cementing itself as the defining competitive edge in a crowded marketplace. Nearly two thirds of marketers (64%) use the technology for ad generation, while over half (53%) utilize it to personalize experiences. Allocating budgets (47%) and optimizing campaigns (40%) were other popular use cases for the technology.
The report paints a picture of a region entering an exciting new era of growth — one where success depends on combining speed, creativity, and data-driven strategy.
