Casual Games Increasingly Adopt Casino Sector Techniques to Become Key Gambling Mechanics-Shaped Mobile Gaming Trend

Liftoff and Singular have published a joint report on the mobile gaming market for 2024. The study is based on data on 1.4 trillion ad impressions, 63 billion clicks, 2.5 billion installs, and $11.9 billion in ad spend.

A collaborative report by the Liftoff and Singular platforms on the 2025 mobile gaming market has been released. Liftoff is a platform that maximizes revenue for mobile firms by offering monetization, marketing, and creative solutions driven by machine learning that improve ad experiences and link consumers with their favorite items. Singular’s next-generation attribution and analytics enable marketers to future-proof their expansion by offering a comprehensive solution that includes configurable ROI (return on investment) analytics, industry-leading cost aggregation, mobile attribution, and automatic loading straight into businesses’ BI (business intelligence) tools.

Following a lull in engagement during 2022 and 2023, the mobile gaming business is gradually recovering. Spending on gaming increased 4% year over year (YoY), driven by robust growth in the strategy, puzzle, and action genres. Casual games with a mid-core bent are becoming commonplace in the market.

The “2025 Casual Gaming Apps Report” from Liftoff and Singular looks at the most recent engagement, income, and cost data and provides practical advice on how to grow the game. These days, retention and steady income are just as important to casual games as size. New monetization strategies and improvements to well-known game elements have been made throughout the last 12 months. Developers are discovering dependable methods to improve the player experience in IAA (in-app advertising) contexts, and hybrid casual models are growing in popularity.

Key Data from Report

Let’s highlight the key data from the report:

• The casino niche shows a record CPI (cost per install) on iOS: $21.03, versus $1.41 for casual games.
• Hybrid projects combining puzzles and slot mechanics are gaining a foothold in the top 200 in revenue; for example, Capybara Go! with idle RPG (role-playing game) and casino elements.
• Games with mini-games and light casino formats (Plinko, Board, Drop Merge) increase player engagement and app revenue.
• Games actively use IAA + IAP (in-app purchase), including offers with ad disabling for in-game currency.
• Gambling mechanics are actively used in Puzzle and Match-3 games (for example, Royal Match, Truck Star), since randomization engages players more in the gameplay.

The report emphasizes that casual games are increasingly adopting techniques from the casino sector, and hybrid models with elements of betting on the best mobile bookies and competitive events were among the main drivers of retention and growth in 2024.