Most popular cell phone games

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Table of Contents Return to The Top AFK Arena Angry Birds 2 Ballz Brawl Stars Candy Crush Friends Saga Color Road! Draw Something Empires & Puzzles: Epic Match 3 Flow Free Geometry Dash Lily's Garden New York Times Crosswords Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time Snake VS Block Subway Surfers Toon Blast Two Dots Woodoku Words With Friends 2 Wordscapes

You can play video games from anywhere these days—a home console, gaming PC, streamed over the internet, or on your smartphone or tablet. For many, loading up new devices with games is priority No. 1 in order to pass the time during a morning commute, at a doctor's office, or on the couch. Sometimes, however, a silly little phone game turns into hours of non-stop gameplay. If you're looking for the most addictive games you can play on your iPhone or Android phone, check out the list below. Good luck trying to get anything else done!

What are the top 50 mobile games of 2022 so far? I thought you’d never ask!

Globally we’ve collectively downloaded more than 70 billion mobile apps so far in 2022 and more than half of them are games. While apps finally surpassed games in the U.S. for the first time ever in terms of revenue, the reality is that both globally and in both the U.S., games are the vast majority of smartphone downloads and massively significant in terms of mobile revenue. 

All of which means: it’s time to share the top 50 games of 2022 so far.

Most downloaded mobile games so far in 2022

So far, according to SensorTower data, the top games of 2022 by downloads are pretty jammed with familiar names:

1. Subway Surfers  ~82 million downloads
2. Garena Free Fire  ~75 million downloads
3. Stumble Guys  ~46 million downloads
4. Bridge Race  ~45 million downloads
5. Ludo King  ~44 million downloads
6. Roblox  ~41 million downloads
7. Tall Man Run  ~39 million downloads
8. Race Master 3D  ~37 million downloads
9. Candy Crush Saga  ~36 million downloads
10. Fill The Fridge   ~35 million downloads

But are the most downloaded games the top ones?

Each of those mobile games has a lot of downloads, but number of installs alone can’t be enough to make the list of the top 50 mobile games of 2022. Sure, scale is interesting — how many installs a game achieved — but engagement and active players and actual usage is probably much more important. One of the ways to measure that is revenue: do players playing these mobile games love them enough to lay out cold hard cash? Are these games good enough to pull out your credit card? [Or, yes, allow Apple or Google to take another little chunk out of your bank account.]

Perhaps the best way to determine the best games of 2022 is a combination of both: 

• how many installs a game received
• how much gameplay — and therefore revenue — it’s generating

That combination is important. 

A top game should still be relevant to new players: it should be adding new people, or else it’s just slowly dying. In addition, it should also keep existing players engaged, interested, and having fun for at least months, and preferentially years.

That makes it fresh enough for newbies, and still interesting for veterans.

The reality is that it is only the very unusual, extraordinary game that gets released years ago — even a decade ago, Subway Surfers! — and is still big. It’s an even more extraordinary game, like Clash of Clans, Roblox, or Call of Duty, that is still at or near the top of the revenue charts years and years after its initial release.

iOS, then Android, then combined

First, we’ll look at iOS.

iOS might seem small. After all, it only accounts for about 20% of global downloads: 8 billion in Q2 2022 to Android’s 27 billion, according to SensorTower data. But even so, iOS still takes credit for more than half of all in-app mobile revenue … thanks largely to the geographies where Apple owns market share: typically richer countries in North America, Europe, and certain parts of Asia.

Then we’ll look at Android, where the vast majority of app and game installs happen, especially in massive Android-centric countries like India. [And China, but data is hard to come by there thanks to the proliferation of third-party app stores.]

And finally, we’ll combine scores to arrive at an overall list of top 50 games of 2022 so far.

Data will be US-centric [sorry!] but perhaps we’ll be able to do other countries or regions later. For installs, I’m looking at recent data from Apptopia: games that are hot right now, but the top grossing component of the score will bias towards games with some track record. And I’m weighting the scores about 60/40 in favor of revenue as a stronger engagement metric.

iOS: top 50 games of 2022 so far

Only 8 games are on both the top 50 downloads list and the top 50 revenue list in Apptopia’s data:

• Call of Duty: Mobile
• Candy Crush Saga
• Coin Master
• Evony
• Fishdom
• Pokémon GO
• Roblox
• Stumble Guys

Naturally, they’re heavily featured in the top 50 games for iOS:

Rank	Game	Combined score for downloads & revenue
1	Roblox	171
2	Candy Crush Saga	159
3	Fishdom	157
4	Call of Duty: Mobile	146
5	Evony	145
6	Pokémon GO	144
7	Coin Master	137
8	Stumble Guys	124
9	Dragon Ball Z Dokkan Battle	97
10	Royal Match	96
11	Homescapes	94
12	Gardenscapes	91
13	Clash of Clans	90
14	Top War: Battle Game	89
15	Diablo Immortal	88
16	Clash Royale	87
17	Garena Free Fire	86
18	Hero Wars – Fantasy idle RPG	83
19	Candy Crush Soda Saga	82
20	Puzzles & Survival	81
21	State of Survival: Zombie War	80
22	Toon Blast	79
23	Bingo Blitz	78
24	DoubleDown Casino	77
25	Jackpot Party – Casino Slots	76
26	Genshin Impact	75
27	Slotomania Slots Vegas Casino	74
28	Age of Origins: Tower Defense	73
29	Lightning Link Casino Slots	72
30	RAID: Shadow Legends	71
31	Subway Surfers	71
32	Clear the Lot!	70
33	Township	70
34	Parking Jam 3D	69
35	Solitaire Grand Harvest	69
36	Boba Tale	68
37	King’s Choice	68
38	Mexican Train Dominoes	67
39	Project Makeover	67
40	Count Masters: Crowd Runner 3D	66
41	Rise of Kingdoms	66
42	Fill the Fridge!	65
43	Marvel Contest of Champions	65
44	Cashman Casino Las Vegas Slots	64
45	Collect Em All! Clear the Dots	64
46	Apex Legends Mobile	63
47	World Series of Poker	63
48	Dragon Ball Legends	62
49	Among Us!	61
50	Toy Blast	61

Interestingly, 7 of these games are gambling, slots, or casino games, which just highlights how big mashups have become in mobile gaming. 

And many of them are games that have had a significant life span, including:

• The first versions of Roblox were released in 2006, before the App Store [!!]
• Call of Duty: Mobile is part of a franchise that launched in 2003
• Pokémon GO was released in 2015, meaning it’s now 7 years old
• Clash of Clans was launched in 2012
• And of course the always-massive King titles such as Candy Crush Saga and Candy Crush Soda Saga also have their genesis in 2012 [and the original, Candy Crush Saga, now has over a trillion levels played]
• Evony has been around [in different forms!] since 2009

Android: top 50 games of 2022 so far

Possibly because Android is more geographically diverse in market share than iOS, only 3 games show up on both most-downloaded and highest-grossing lists:

• Candy Crush Saga
• Coin Master
• Roblox

Here are the top 50 games for Android so far in 2022:

Rank	Game	Combined score for downloads & revenue
1	Roblox	169
2	Candy Crush Saga	143
3	Coin Master	130
4	Evony	96
5	Pokémon Go	95
6	Royal Match	94
7	Bingo Blitz – Bingo Game	93
8	RAID: Shadow Legends	92
9	Jackpot Party Casino Slots	91
10	Fate/Grand Order	90
11	Candy Crush Soda Saga	89
12	Solitaire Grand Harvest	88
13	Township	87
14	Diablo Immortal	86
15	Fishdom	85
16	Homescapes	84
17	State of Survival: Zombie War	83
18	Top War: Battle Game	82
19	Puzzles & Survival	81
20	Dragon Ball Z Dokkan Battle	80
21	Slotomania Slots Casino Games	79
22	Toon Blast	78
23	Gardenscapes	77
24	Genshin Impact	76
25	Marvel Strike Force: Squad RPG	75
26	Cashman Casino Las Vegas Slots	74
27	Craft School: Monster Class	74
28	Lotsa Slots – Casino Games	73
29	Parking Jam 3D	73
30	POP! Slots Vegas Casino games	72
31	Empires & Puzzles: Match-3 RPG	71
32	Stumble Guys	71
33	Cash Frenzy – Casino Slots	70
34	Junkyard Keeper	70
35	Aquarium Land	69
36	Tiki Solitaire TriPeaks	69
37	Hoard Master	68
38	Merge Dragons	68
39	Call of Duty: Mobile	67
40	Subway Surfers	67
41	Goods Match 3D – Triple Master	66
42	June’s Journey: Hidden Objects	66
43	Garena Free Fire	65
44	Woodoku	65
45	Crowd Evolution!	64
46	Rise of Kingdoms: Lost Crusade	64
47	Last Shelter: Survival	63
48	Pull the Pin	63
49	DoubleDown Casino Vegas Slots	62
50	Fill The Fridge	62

Once again, Roblox and Candy Crush Saga are #1 and #2 together. And, just like on iOS, 7 of the top 50 games are casino/Vegas/gambling games.

More striking, perhaps, is the overlap between iOS top games and Android top games. A full 32 games are on both the top 50 iOS and top 50 Android games lists, meaning that 64% of the top 100 is common to both major mobile platforms.

That makes sense on a lot of levels: good games rise to the top, big marketing budgets help make both the iOS and Android versions of a game to get popular, and everyone releases for both major platforms. Also, for battle games that require a critical mass of players to form clans or teams, or to match up in fights, being big on one platform tends to help a game get big on the other.

Plus, of course, when a game gets popular it starts to generate its own buzz, and both people and platforms tend to start promoting it.

Combined iOS and Android: top 50 mobile games of 2022 so far

At last, here are the top 50 mobile games of 2022 so far based on Android and iOS and number of installs plus amount of revenue, which is a proxy for players, usage, and engagement.

Completely unsurprisingly given their positioning in both the iOS and Android top lists, Roblox and Candy Crush Saga are #1 and #2, respectively. Coin Master, Fishdom, and Evony round out the top 5 games of 2022 so far.

Rank	Game	Combined score for iOS & Android
1	Roblox	340
2	Candy Crush Saga	302
3	Coin Master	267
4	Fishdom	242
5	Evony	241
6	Pokémon GO	239
7	Call of Duty: Mobile	213
8	Stumble Guys	195
9	Royal Match	190
10	Homescapes	178
11	Dragon Ball Z Dokkan Battle	177
12	Diablo Immortal	174
13	Bingo Blitz	171
14	Candy Crush Soda Saga	171
15	Top War: Battle Game	171
16	Gardenscapes	168
17	Jackpot Party – Casino Slots	167
18	RAID: Shadow Legends	163
19	State of Survival: Zombie War	163
20	Puzzles & Survival	162
21	Solitaire Grand Harvest	157
22	Toon Blast	157
23	Township	157
24	Slotomania Slots Casino Games	153
25	Garena Free Fire	151
26	Genshin Impact	151
27	Fate/Grand Order	150
28	Clash of Clans	149
29	Parking Jam 3D	142
30	DoubleDown Casino	139
31	Cashman Casino Las Vegas Slots	138
32	Subway Surfers	138
33	Marvel Strike Force: Squad RPG	134
34	Lightning Link Casino Slots	133
35	Empires & Puzzles Match 3 RPG	127
36	Fill The Fridge	127
37	Cash Frenzy – Casino Slots	125
38	Woodoku	124
39	Among Us	117
40	Collect Em All! Clear the Dots	117
41	Crowd Evolution!	116
42	Count Masters: Crowd Runner 3D	113
43	Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes	113
44	Star Trek Fleet Command	111
45	Junkyard Keeper	104
46	Wordle!	104
47	Wordscapes	104
48	The President	100
49	Dig Deep	98
50	Hoard Master	97

Amazingly, Pokémon GO continues its massive and perhaps unpredictable run of success. Pokémon GO is exceptional for perhaps one other thing: the least amount of paid marketing to kick it off, thanks to the strength of the Pokémon brand and massive initial virality when it launched.

Wordle is still major, months after its brush with virality, and Woodoku carries the torch for Sudoku, but in a new, creative, and impressive way. 

Just for fun, Star Trek and Star Wars are battling it out right next to each other in the #43 and #44 spot, and while Marvel Contest of Champions doesn’t quite make the combined iOS and Android list, Marvel Strike Force: Squad RPG does, thanks to its strength on Android primarily.

And in the battle of Playrix Games super-popular ‘scapes offerings, Homescapes at #10 leads Gardenscapes at #16.

Closing thoughts on the top games of 2022

There are plenty more ways to find and list the top games of any year, including 2022. 

My current favorite game is 6 years old and didn’t make the list, for one thing, and another option would be to check all the game reviews of the year and see which ones are the highest rated by reviewers as well as the highest rated on Google Play and the App Store.

It’s also interesting to think about why a game might make the most downloaded but not the most profitable lists, and vice versa. Top grossing games, for instance, might be in a monetization phase: they’ve gathered a huge number of players, and now they need to make some money back for all their development and marketing. And top games by installs that don’t hit the top grossing list might just be in a category that doesn’t monetize super well — casual games, I’m looking at you — or might be focusing on scale rather than revenue.

In any case, if your favorite game didn’t make the list, that’s probably because with 10 million apps in Google Play and the iOS App Store, there’s a lot of choice. There’s something for everyone.

And that’s probably a good thing.