The VPN that Won the Ban on TikTok
This is a single insight from This Week in Apps - Nord's Big Break. Check out the full article for more insights.
TikTok returned to the App Store and Google Play in the US this weekend after about a month of being officially banned. On ban day, US users rushed to download VPN apps thinking they'd help them keep their beloved short-video feed.
They didn't, but that pushed many VPN apps to the top of the charts.
The hype came and went, but of all the VPN apps in the store, one won the race big time!
NordVPN is one of the most popular VPN services on and off mobile thanks in large to its amazing investment in advertising. For a very long time it was hard not to see a YouTube video sponsored by the service.
No-name brand VPN apps flood the App Store and Google Play, and a few managed to get visibility thanks to search ads and App Store Optimization, but when it comes to branded apps, Nord is at the top.
That's why its revenue has more than doubled since the beginning of 2023 and is now earning more than $250K of net revenue, what Nord gets to keep after store fees, every day (on average). And that number continues to rise.
On January 19th, a date that might sound familiar because it was the day TikTok was banned in the US, Nord's revenue rose higher than ever before - and not by a smidge.
According to our App Intelligence, NordVPN's net revenue crossed $800K. In just one day!
NordVPN's revenue is already double what it was at the same time last year and with the way the internet and global politics are playing, I don't see this rise slowing down any time soon.
The takeaway here isn't that you should build a VPN but rather that you should build a brand - I hope you caught that.
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All figures included in this report are estimated. Unless specified otherwise, estimated revenue is always net, meaning it's the amount the developer earned after Apple and Google took their fee.
