Hyper casual market is shrinking, and Match 3 games face market saturation, finds Liftoff in new report

The report features insights and data from the 500 highest-grossing mobile games over the past two years and data from over 390 billion ad impressions and 16.7 billion clicks across 100 million installs.

Key findings from this report include:

• The hypercasual market has seen a 20% decline, falling from 50% in Q1 2021 to just over 30% in Q1 2023. Mobile game developers have combatted this decline by merging game mechanics to create hybrid casual games with a much broader motivational appeal and better monetisation opportunities due to their mix of different gameplay layers.

• 100% of the top ten grossing casual games featured competitive events last year, and the vast majority implemented co-op tournaments and race events in a bid to broaden the appeal of their games by tapping into the competitiveness of their players.

• Over a quarter of casual games on the market use mini-games outside of their core gameplay mechanic to drive user acquisition and engagement.

• Match 3 games are facing severe market saturation, making it incredibly difficult for emerging titles to make the charts; of all the traditional match 3 games releases in the last two years, only two have become top-grossing titles.