The news: Mobile advertising remains concentrated around a few dominant platforms, but challengers are gaining ground, per AppsFlyer’s Performance Index.

Worldwide, Google Ads and Apple Ads remain No. 1 and No. 2, respectively, but AppLovin, Mintegral, Meta Ads, and TikTok for Business are climbing the rankings.

Why it's worth watching: In the US, industries including telecom, tech, consumer packaged goods (CPG), and healthcare are pushing further into mobile ads and direct 57.1% to 73.0% of digital ad spend to mobile, per our forecast.

This reflects a market shaped by sharper competition, tighter efficiency, and ongoing ecosystem maturity increasingly directed at mobile. It also fuels demand for scalable performance networks.

The data: 3 of the top 4 ad networks and platforms grew mobile ad spend YoY, consistent with the 2024 Index, and 4 of the rest of the top 10 also increased spend, per AppsFlyer.

• iOS drove most of 2025’s overall ad spend growth globally, aided by privacy-safe measurement and higher-value users—a continuation of its 26% increase from 2023 to 2024.
• Android gains clustered around the strongest ad networks, reflecting a quality-over-volume shift.

The competition: Several platforms made significant moves this year.

• AppLovin delivered big gains across iOS and Android gaming while leading in Tier 1 regions like North America and Western Europe.
• Meta Ads and TikTok for Business strengthened their hold on non-gaming as brands chase mobile-first audiences.
• Mintegral surged across Android categories, reflecting growing appetite for diversified mobile channels.

What this means for brands: With mobile now the leading channel in nearly every major industry, competition is intensifying around creative efficiency, privacy-safe measurement, and cross-platform diversification.

Marketers should:

• Prioritize mobile-first creative.
• Test emerging networks early.
• Diversify across iOS and Android to hedge volatility.
• For a strategic edge, focus on privacy-centric attribution data like Apple’s SKAdNetwork and Meta’s Aggregated Event Measurement (AEM), which use anonymized data and force brands to optimize statistically.