How Developers Actually Reach Players in 2026 | Chirag Ambwani Interview

The hardest thing for any developer when we get questions on is how do we get to our audience. So we've seen a lot of AI usage in creative development. We've seen a lot of AI usage on how do we optimize our spend. And I just think this trend will uh continue to grow beginning of the year. What would it be Sherro without understanding the state of mobile and that from sensor tower particularly since a lot of people are still quoting last year's thought bomb right non-gaming crossed over higher than gaming that was a big hit in the non-gaming tracks right so what do you have and what have you shared for the state of mobile for this year
I think the big uh topic that came out yesterday was ultimately uh mobile gaming is doing extremely well uh it just hit uh 25 was the biggest year since the pandemic in terms of mobile

gaming crossing over 82 billion in revenue and of course for a lot of folks um we don't include the web store revenue yet. So in reality mobile gaming is doing quite well. Uh you could see a world where it's probably north of now $90 billion that's going to the Apple Google and the web store side which just means gaming's quite healthy. Mobile especially is very healthy. So, uh, I will say, however, non-gaming is still doing extremely well. They did also have a record year, but ultimately I think it's a great sign for if you're a developer or publisher in this space that there's still a massive opportunity.
Well, let's do that. Let's talk about the opportunities because um, a lot I've been hearing about also from studios is saying, "Hey, my next game isn't a game. My next game is short drama because it's an untapped market." And you got to say, they do have guts, right? It's a little bit of grit because it is primarily Asia, but here we are in PGC London and I'm hearing like Western studios saying this is what I'm going to do. What does your data does it bear that out? Does it

say yeah, you're on the right track?
Yeah, I mean, let me start off by saying I think short drama was one of the fastest new categories that's grown over the last two years. What's actually quite interesting is when you look at some of the major publishers in the short drama space, they're actually former gaming companies. Uh so one of the biggest one is uh Crazy Maple Studios. Uh they have uh this major title called episodes in the market and again I think a big uh theme that I think we're seeing as to why the non-gaming side is growing a lot is a lot of them are taking the applications of gaming such as around live ops around the way they do monetization and I think then applying it to the app side. So I think for the game developers I think taking their learnings and applying it to the non-gaming side I think is why I think you're seeing so much more growth ultimately I think the short space has done extremely well in the uh in the east but now you're starting to see that growth in the west as well.
You talked about monetization. What's that mix looking like? What's sensor

tower telling us about that mix? I'm hearing about blended monetization. So, don't choose. Actually, just let the ad or how you got the user tell you because if they responded to an ad, they like ads. Give them ads. If they didn't do that, take them over to AP and don't don't mix them and don't try to complicate things. What is the mix now? I think traditionally in gaming, I think there's always been a notion that gamers do not like advertising, which is not wrong, but I think mobile has done something that I think the PC console side hasn't been able to explore, which is if you reward players for watching ads and experiencing ads, they're actually gravitate towards it. I also think this blended monetization will only continue because it allows a gaming studio or a game publisher to actually monetize the whole space where you'll always have a finite amount of folks who want to do AP purchases. But that means you're potentially leaving 90% of your users not being able to monetize. So

this blended between subscriptions, AP purchases, advertising is the way that we're seeing more and more developers going about it because ultimately I think uh mobile gaming audience is quite diverse and not all of them monetize the same way.
So blended is hot and what about the genres? Where should developers be looking? If they're maybe not launching a new game because I don't know how many are, but they are building it into the events, they are building into live ops. Where should they be going? What should it be, folks?
I mean, uh, should not surprise you.
Uh, genre that is always hot is going to be the puzzle space.
Puzzle's doing extremely well. Um, I think what's been interesting is, you know, we we talked about this two years ago where we started to see more and more studios focus on their live titles versus launch new titles. Um, and part of that is because I think ultimately monetizing your full player base has become more and more top of mind for

everybody. But again, I think it's you I think there's still a massive opportunity if you are a publisher to launch new titles. Uh, one that I like bringing up is some of the newest titles in the market that have hit a billion dollars have only launched in the last year or two, some of them include like Kingshot, White Out Survival, these are billion-dollar titles that have only launched about two years ago, which I think for developers is a sign that if you do build good titles, there is a market. But puzzle still very hot. I will say uh I shared this yesterday and I think I got a lot of folks who were surprised by this no which is Clash of Clans hit its all-time monthly revenue last uh last year and the last time they did that was in 2012. So it's been a decade. So there is this still an opportunity if you have good titles on the market. I think all genres have an opportunity. Puzzle is still the dominant. You see strategy midcore doing well. One category we are seeing three years in a row decline is sports and

racing. And I'm not sure it's that. I think we're all starting to get a little older and maybe sports is not become as not part of everyone's lives like it used to be. But I think that's been the interesting one which is sports has had a couple years of decline.
So looking at the trends as well something that you saw in the data where it was like wait let me check that. Is that for real? looking at some of these legacy titles, right? Like when you look at Candy Crush, you look at Clash of Clans,
they've been on the market for 14, 15 years, and I'm like,
as long as I've been in the industry, I've been writing about these guys. Absolutely.
And you know, and when I go into Sensor Tower and I'm like, okay, what are the top 10, top 20 companies? I'm like, it's the same ones. uh which again I think is a sign that more and more folks and the ultimately having a really good live ops strategy is very important in this new world. Um but again I think that's always been quite surprising to me. I think another thing that's quite surprising to me and I think I said this yesterday as well is just the dominance

of Asia publishers in the west now. I think this was the first year where more than uh 50% of the top grossing games are by Asia publishers, specifically Chinese developers. And I think for the west, I think there's an opportunity here uh to really learn from the way that they've sort of launched new titles in the last couple years and how they've really monetized and uh scaled up their titles. I think a fun one also is you are starting to see puzzle specifically in the casual space growing in in the east which I think has always been an interesting one because the east has always been quite dominated by midcore and we've started to see a rise of puzzle and casual and I think that's a big opportunity for western developers. So I was in Vietnam at the Google Apex Summit and we were in Vietnam for a reason because there was the Hall of Fame. These companies are massively successful and extremely innovative interestingly in AI. So that AI concept coming together with the games be it that it's part of the game like an AI

helper or an AI assistant in the game.
What about AI? You can't do an interview without talking about AI. So what what do we have about AI and trends?
Yeah, it's actually pretty interesting. So I will say we are definitely starting to see more and more folks start implementing AI in their you uh workflows, right? I think it's interesting because I think there's a general feeling that there's going to be more titles that are going to come out on the market because it allows
smaller folks with smaller teams and lean teams to start building titles. What's been interesting personally for me is we've seen now two years in a row that there's been less mobile games that have launched. However, you look at the opposite on the PC console side where the PC side has exploded in the amount of new games that have launched. So, it's quite interesting where I think you're starting to see maybe there's a potential that AI is being used by maybe more the PC console side versus mobile. The other thing that I think is really interesting is I think it's less around the building of the titles that I've

seen AI usage but more how do you optimize your titles and it goes back to like live ops. It it goes back to advertising. I think look the hardest thing for any developer when we get questions on is how do we get to our audience? So we've seen a lot of AI usage in creative development. We've seen a lot of AI usage on how do we optimize our spend and I just think this trend will uh continue to grow and ultimately I think there unlike a lot of other fads I think AI is here to stay
and then of course um you're here to stay because I come to you every year state of mobile or something similar and and you're evolving as well with your own data and your own way of sort of understanding the industry you know blended metrics some things that you have they're your own IP. So tell me a little bit to end it with you personally at sensor tower. Is there something new and innovative in how you are looking at the data that can inform you know the

blueprints of all of these studios? What's going on there to make it easier to plan and to win?
Yeah, you know our our philosophy at Sensar is we ultimately want to try to provide as much data to our customers as possible, right? And I think a lot of folks know Sensar as being the leader in the mobile space, which you know will always be bread and butter for our business, but
but you're branching out. I'm seeing you in like CNBC, right? You're talking about trends that I wasn't thinking about.
If you're a developer, a publisher, or a brand, you can't just be on one ecosystem, right? Your audience is everywhere.
And you know, we're starting to get more and more questions, which is why over the last 18 months,
we've done a ton of acquisitions and I've done a new product launches. We now have a PC console product. We're now building a web store product. We have an ad revenue product coming out. So I think ultimately our goal is one on the gaming side. We want to be the complete shop for all things gaming. Right? Right now if you want to know how big the games market is, you have to go to four different providers. Our goal is we want

to be able to tell you how big the game space is. But now, you know, we have an ads data set, we have a web data set because ultimately it goes back to we want to try to tell everybody how the digital landscape is doing because your audience is everywhere and understanding how your audience interacts with web, mobile, TV is all very important.
Excellent. So, that's very exciting because that is exactly it. So many tracks that I was at personally or moderating start with again we're going back to the audience the customer user psychology
and understanding that at every step so ad revenue is going to be a big one I'll be watching for that data you'll be telling me right when it's the time to come
you will be the first one on my list to say
I appreciate that and I'll keep you to that it's a date you're on rock always a pleasure
thanks so much
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