Minecraft Earth clocks up 1.4m downloads in its debut week, 1.2m of which were in the US

Minecraft Earth has generated 1.4 million downloads since it launched on the App Store and Google Play on November 12th, 2019. 

Of that 1.4m, U.S. players accounted for a staggering 1.2m – that’s 86.2 per cent – while the UK comes up in second place with just 5 per cent at 71,000 installs, and Canada third with 37,000 downloads, or 2.6 per cent.  

On top of the downloads clocked up whilst the augmented reality game was in beta testing, this sees the total number of downloads approach 2.5 million. This makes it the third most popular game on the App Store on November 18th, and 14th on the Google Play charts.

According to mobile analysts Sensor Tower Intelligence, the launch has netted Mojang $93,000 in gross revenue – $86,000 of which (92.8 per cent) came from U.S. players. Users in the UK spent just the equivalent of $2,500, or 2.7 per cent, and players in Canada just $1,500, (1.6 per cent).

“While technically not Minecraft Earth’s full launch, it still lags behind other big hitters such as Pokémon Go from Niantic, which generated 32.7 million installs in its first week in the U.S., and Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, which picked up 3.1 million downloads in its first week,” the report said.

The game seems most popular on Apple devices, with just over a million installs – 73.4 per cent – coming from the App Store. Google Play accounted for 376,000 downloads, or 26.6 per cent. Apple also secured the lion’s share of revenue, too, racking up $62,000 – 66.6 per cent of all recorded revenue. 

In other mobile news, Niantic’s hugely-successful augmented reality mobile game, Pokémon Go, has surpassed $3 billion in lifetime gross revenue. The mobile game has been downloaded approximately 541 million times to date worldwide. In 2016 alone the game generated $842.4 million in gross revenue but 2019 may still eclipse its record year as revenue this year currently stands at $774.3 million with two months still to go.

“This year’s sales have been spurred on by updates such as Pokémon Go’s introduction of Team Rocket,” Sensor Tower said at the time. “We previously estimated that the update had helped drive approximately $110 million in player spend in August 2019, while in September Pokémon GO generated $126 million in gross revenue. So far in October, user spending has hit an estimated $67.8 million.”