What Is a Good Ad CTR for Mobile Games? 2026 CTR Benchmarks by Channel, Format, and OS, and When a High CTR Misleads
Click-through rate is the first number a mobile game ad dashboard shows, and one of the hardest to interpret. For the same "game ad CTR," sources report around 1% in the Meta feed, more than 9% on in-app ad networks, and 25.9% on iOS in the first half of 2025. Those numbers are not contradicting one another. They are measuring different things.
Gather the public data available as of October 2026 and two conclusions stand out. First, CTR cannot be compared at all unless the channel, format, and OS are held fixed. Second, CTR is not a goal in itself: multiplied by the click-to-install rate it becomes IPM (installs per 1,000 impressions), and IPM combined with CPM becomes CPI. When clicks do not turn into installs, a higher CTR points to where money is leaking, not to where it is working.
The price of impressions is covered in What Are 1,000 Ad Impressions Worth? 2026 Mobile Game eCPM Benchmarks by Format, Region, and OS, and the Q4 Price Window, and the price of installs in Mobile Game CPI Benchmarks 2026: Why One Average Is Useless. This post covers the metric in between. It lays out CTR figures by channel, format, and OS with their sources, shows how to read CTR inside the funnel, and walks through the cases where a high CTR sends the wrong signal.
What Is CTR, and Where Does It Sit in the Game UA Funnel?
CTR is the share of ad impressions that produce a click, and in the game UA funnel it is the first conversion rate in the sequence impression, click, install. On its own it says little; it only becomes a cost once it is multiplied by the next step, the click-to-install rate.
The formula is clicks divided by impressions, times 100. Multiply CTR by the click-to-install rate (installs divided by clicks) and by 1,000, and you get IPM. Divide CPM by IPM and you get CPI. In short: IPM = CTR × click-to-install rate × 1,000, and CPI = CPM ÷ IPM.
Large-scale data shows the relationship in practice. The gaming sample in Liftoff's 2025 Casual Gaming Apps Report, built on Singular data from February 2024 to February 2025, totals 1.1 trillion impressions, 36 billion clicks, and 2.4 billion installs. Dividing those totals gives a CTR of about 3.3%, a click-to-install rate of about 6.7%, and an IPM of about 2.2. Roughly one click in thirty, and a little over two impressions in a thousand, turned into an install. These ratios are calculated from the published totals rather than stated in the report, so they are best used for a sense of scale across game advertising as a whole.
The formula matters because doubling CTR does nothing for IPM if the click-to-install rate halves. Suppose creative A has a 4% CTR and a 5% click-to-install rate, for an IPM of 2.0, while creative B has an 8% CTR and a 2% click-to-install rate, for an IPM of 1.6. At the same $10 CPM, A's CPI is $5.00 and B's is $6.25. The creative with twice the CTR costs 25% more per install.
One term needs clarifying. "CVR" is used in two senses in the industry: the rate at which ad clicks become installs, and the rate at which store page visits become installs. The CVR reported by ASO tools is usually the latter, so when reading an ad funnel, check which one you are looking at.
What Is the Game Ad CTR by Channel Type?
Game ad CTR ranges from around 1% to over 10% depending on the channel type. Social feeds are lowest, in-app ad networks run several times higher, and search ads, where intent is explicit, are high on both clicks and installs.
Channel type | Metric | Figure | Period and scope | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Meta (Facebook) feed, gaming industry | CTR | Avg. ~0.99% (high 1.28%, low 0.70%) | July 2025 to July 2026; all-industry avg. ~2.04% | Superads |
In-app ad networks, casual games | CTR | Android 9.4%, iOS 8.8% | Feb 2024 to Feb 2025, hypercasual included | Liftoff × Singular |
In-app ad networks, all games | CTR | Android avg. 3.9%, iOS casino 6.5% | Feb 2024 to Feb 2025 | Statista |
In-app ad networks, all games | CTR | iOS 6.1% (Jan 2025) to 25.9% (June 2025); Android ~5% | H1 2025 | Singular |
Apple Ads search results, all apps | TTR / tap-to-install rate | 11.4% / 67.2% | Jan to Dec 2024, all categories including games | SplitMetrics |
Game CTR in the Meta feed runs at about half the all-industry average. Superads' figures, based on more than $3 billion in Facebook ad spend, put the gaming industry's CTR at an average of about 0.99% from July 2025 to July 2026, well below the all-industry average of about 2.04%. In the feed, a game ad competes with ads from every other industry in the same scroll, so this number should not be placed on the same line as in-app network figures.
In-app ad network CTR for games is far higher. In the Liftoff and Singular report, casual games posted the highest CTR of any mobile category, 9.4% on Android and 8.8% on iOS. For the same period, Statista's breakdown by genre and platform shows an Android game average of 3.9% and an iOS casino figure of 6.5%. A game ad shown inside another game reaches someone who is already playing, and full-screen formats such as interstitials and rewarded video are common, so clicks come more readily.
Apple Ads behaves differently. SplitMetrics analyzed 4.4 billion impressions and 395.4 million taps from January to December 2024 and found an average search results TTR (tap-through rate) of 11.4% and a tap-to-install rate of 67.2%, with an average games CPA of $2.00. Because the user has typed the search themselves, the share of clicks that become installs is several times higher than on in-app networks. Calculated from the sample totals the same company published for its 2026 edition (6.3 billion impressions, 495.6 million taps, 315.6 million downloads), TTR comes to about 7.9% and the tap-to-install rate to about 63.7%: fewer clicks than the year before, but a similar install conversion.
In short, a 1% Meta feed CTR and a 9% in-app network CTR do not rank one above the other; they reflect how each channel is built. Comparisons across channels should be made on IPM or CPI, not CTR.
What Is the CTR for Each Ad Format?
Sources broadly agree that rewarded video and playables have the highest CTR and banners the lowest, but the absolute values differ by an order of magnitude or more between sources, and neutral public data is practically nonexistent.
As of October 2026, it is hard to find a neutral report that publishes game ad CTR by format with its dataset and period disclosed. The table below therefore sets side by side the ranges most often quoted in the industry, by source. None of the three discloses its underlying data, so it is safer to read the table for the spread between sources than for any individual figure.
Format | MWM glossary (US iOS, 2026 anchors) | Adapty (updated Feb 2026) | Yango Ads (Oct 2025) |
|---|---|---|---|
Banner | 0.5–2% | 0.1–0.3% | 0.05–0.1% |
Native | 1–4% | Not given | 0.5–1% |
Interstitial (static) | 2–6% | 4–5% (Android) | 4–5% |
Interstitial (video) | 3–8% | Not given | Not given |
Rewarded video | 6–15%+ | Not given | Listed only as "opt-in based," no figure |
Playable | 5–15% | Not given | Not given |
Banners alone range from 0.05% to 2%, a 40x spread. With gaps that large, external ranges cannot serve as targets. The one reliable piece of information in the table is the order: formats that take over the full screen and hold attention get higher CTR, and banners sitting at the edge of the screen get the lowest.
Rewarded video CTR needs to be read on its own terms. Players choose to watch rewarded ads in exchange for a reward, so completion is high, and the store card or end card shown after the video creates plenty of chances to click. As the following sections show, though, on iOS in 2025 that same structure was identified as a main cause of abnormally inflated CTR.
Playables are better judged on install efficiency than on CTR. According to Liftoff's 2025 Mobile Ad Creative Index (4.7 trillion impressions, 263 billion clicks, and 1.1 billion installs between January 2023 and May 2025), the impression-to-install rate for playables was 8 times that of non-playable formats for top spenders and 16 times for other game advertisers. When a playable's production cost pays off is covered in detail in Playable Ads: The Conditions That Justify a $5,000 Production Bill.
Native is the format with the least usable public data in a gaming context. Even the ranges in the table run from 0.5% to 4%, which makes it hard to set a baseline without your own data.
How Does CTR Differ by OS and Region?
Depending on the genre, game ad CTR can be higher on Android or on iOS, but since 2025 iOS CTR has been so heavily shaped by measurement mechanics that it no longer compares cleanly with Android. By country, there is no neutral public table, only directional signals.
Dimension | Android | iOS | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
Casual game CTR | 9.4% | 8.8% | Liftoff × Singular (Feb 2024 to Feb 2025) |
Genre pattern | Slightly higher in most genres | Much higher for puzzle and casino (casino 6.5%) | Liftoff × Singular, Statista |
Game CTR trend | Games ~5%; overall CTR flat for six months | 6.1% to 25.9% (Jan to June 2025) | Singular |
Installs per impression | Almost 3x iOS | Baseline | Singular Q3 2025 report |
US store page conversion (all apps) | 16.15% | 8.56% | AppTweak (2025) |
In the Liftoff and Singular report, most game genres had slightly higher CTR on Android, but puzzle and casino were much higher on iOS, and RPG was lower than other genres on both. Because the order flips by genre, a generalization like "Android has higher CTR" does not hold.
The bigger shift came on iOS in 2025. According to Singular, iOS game ad CTR rose every month from 6.1% in January 2025 to 25.9% in June, and overall iOS CTR climbed from 4.3% to 13.4% over the same period. On Android, game CTR sat around 5%, and overall Android CTR barely moved across the same six months. It is hard to believe players became four times more interested in ads in half a year, and Singular traced the cause to measurement mechanics (see the next section).
At the step after the click, Android clearly leads. Singular's Q3 2025 report found that Android ads drive almost three times as many installs per impression as iOS, and in AppTweak's 2025 data the average store page conversion rate on US Google Play was 16.15%, about double the App Store's 8.56%. Android has less friction between the click and the install.
Country-level CTR is where public data is thinnest. According to GameDev Reports' summary of Singular's Q1 2025 game marketing data, Android CTR was lowest in China and highest in tier 3 markets, but exact figures were not published. A high CTR in tier 3 markets does not by itself mean strong performance either. Clicks and post-install revenue are separate questions, so country comparisons should also be made on IPM and post-install metrics, not CTR.
The most recent direction is worth noting too. Singular's Q1 2026 report said both CTR and IPM declined, and its Q2 2026 report showed global IPM down 10.5% while global CPI rose 12.0% to $1.24. The same impressions are producing fewer installs, which makes managing efficiency after the click more important in 2026 than chasing CTR.
When Is a High CTR a Warning Sign?
If CTR is noticeably above the norm but the click-to-install rate or post-install retention does not follow, the clicks are more likely mistakes, or reactions to a promise the game does not keep, than genuine interest. There are three typical cases.
The first is the accidental click. A full-screen interstitial easily leads players to tap the ad while hunting for the close button or while continuing to play. Google AdMob lists as disallowed implementations interstitials on app load or exit, interstitials that appear unexpectedly while a player is absorbed in a task such as gameplay, and more than one interstitial per two user actions. Google Play policy likewise prohibits full-screen interstitials that appear unexpectedly when the user has chosen to do something else, and ads that cause inadvertent clicks. AdSense policy states that accidental clicks count as invalid traffic. A publisher that breaks these rules risks enforcement, but for the advertiser these clicks show up as inflated CTR. What each interstitial costs in retention is covered in The Real Price of an Interstitial: What One Full-Screen Ad Costs You in Retention.
The second is the click created by measurement mechanics. On the 2025 surge in iOS game CTR, Singular pointed primarily to in-game rewarded ads using SKOverlay, Apple's feature that shows an App Store panel inside the ad. Taps made while trying to close the ad get counted as clicks, compounded by an arms race among ad networks to record as many clicks as possible to win conversion credit. Singular went as far as suggesting iOS CTR be treated almost as an impression count. In the SKAdNetwork environment clicks cannot be tracked individually either, so choosing creatives on iOS CTR alone means making decisions unrelated to real interest.
The third is the creative that makes a promise the game cannot keep. A creative showing puzzles or scenes that are not in the actual game sparks curiosity and lifts CTR, but users who see the real screenshots on the store page do not install, and those who do install churn on day one. In the survey of 7,000 gamers that Deloitte and Google AdMob published in June 2025, playable ads with disruptive features doubled the chance that a gamer would quit. It is the classic case of a creative that wins the CTR contest and loses the retention contest.
Symptom | Likely cause | Metrics to check alongside |
|---|---|---|
CTR 2–3x the channel norm, IPM below average | Accidental clicks, measurement mechanics | Click-to-install rate, CTR distribution by publisher and placement |
CTR spikes only on certain publishers or placements | Interstitial implementation problems, invalid traffic | Post-click dwell and bounce, time from click to install |
High CTR and installs, low D1 retention | Creative promising something the game is not | D1 and D7 retention, tutorial completion |
iOS CTR surges while Android stays flat | iOS measurement mechanics such as SKOverlay | IPM by OS, CPI by OS |
Which Metrics Should CTR Be Read Alongside?
Use CTR as a diagnostic for whether a creative earns initial attention, and decide winners on IPM and post-install metrics. Never deciding on CTR alone is the most practical rule as of 2026.
Setting CTR against click-to-install rate in a 2×2 grid sorts creatives quickly.
High click-to-install rate | Low click-to-install rate | |
|---|---|---|
High CTR | Candidate to scale. Confirm post-install retention, then increase budget | Suspect clickbait or accidental clicks. Break down by placement |
Low CTR | Message fits, but the first three seconds are weak. Swap only the hook and retest | Revisit the targeting or the creative direction itself |
In practice, three rules cover it. First, compare against benchmarks only within the same channel, format, and OS. The moment you compare Meta feed CTR to an in-app network average, or post-2025 iOS CTR to Android CTR, the conclusion goes wrong. Second, make IPM the primary metric for creative tests. IPM already multiplies CTR by the click-to-install rate, and dividing CPM by it gives CPI directly, so it is the shortest path to cost. Third, make the final call on post-install metrics. Multiplying IPM by D1 retention, or looking at D7 ROAS alongside it, separates creatives that only attract clicks from creatives that bring players who stay. Creative test design as a whole is covered in Why Creative Testing Is the Highest-Leverage ROAS Driver in Mobile Games.
The role of external benchmarks also needs to be clear. Use the figures in this post only to check whether your game is far off the market, and set targets from your own data by channel, format, OS, and country. Above all, before replacing a creative just because its CTR is below an external average, check its IPM and post-install retention first.
Buying Play Instead of Clicks: The Playio Perspective
When CTR is distorted by accidental clicks and measurement mechanics, channels that charge on installs and post-install actions rather than clicks make performance easier to read.
Judge performance on clicks and all three distortions described above flow into both cost and decisions. In a structure that charges on installs or on completing specific in-game actions, what the advertiser buys is the outcome itself, so clicks made by mistake or drawn by a misleading creative do not turn directly into cost. The context in which a player chooses a game matters too. A player who tapped an ad that popped up mid-game and a player who came in on their own looking for a game that fits their taste behave differently after install.
Playio runs an Android-based gamer community of five million players, analyzing genre preferences, play history, and in-game behavior data to connect games with players whose tastes match. Pricing is CPI by default, and CPE based on reaching a playtime threshold or completing a specific in-game action is also supported. Because the numbers advertisers look at are installs and post-install play rather than click-through rates, running it alongside channels where CTR is hard to interpret can give the whole UA portfolio a stable reference point.
You can find more details here. (https://playioadsen.oopy.io/bizdeck)
Key Takeaways
As of October 2026, mobile game ad CTR spans roughly 1% in the Meta feed, 9% and up for casual games on in-app ad networks, and around 8% to 11% TTR on Apple Ads search, and those gaps reflect channel structure rather than better or worse performance. By format, only the order is consistent, with rewarded video and playables high and banners low; absolute values differ by an order of magnitude or more between sources, and there is practically no neutral public baseline. By OS, the order flips by genre, and while iOS game CTR jumped from 6.1% to 25.9% in 2025, Singular attributed the surge to accidental taps on SKOverlay rewarded ads and a race for click credit. CTR multiplied by the click-to-install rate becomes IPM, and IPM combined with CPM becomes CPI, so a creative with double the CTR but less than half the install rate ends up with a higher CPI. Compare only within the same channel, format, and OS, judge creatives first on IPM and finally on post-install retention and ROAS: that is the simplest way not to be fooled by a high CTR.
For inquiries about Playio's advertising solutions, reach out at: [email protected]
Sources
Liftoff, 2025 Casual Gaming Apps Report (Singular data, February 2024 to February 2025; 1.1T impressions, 36B clicks, 2.4B installs, $11.9B spend; casual CTR Android 9.4%, iOS 8.8%; most genres slightly higher CTR on Android, puzzle and casino much higher on iOS, RPG lower): https://liftoff.ai/?p=34267
GameDev Reports, Liftoff & Singular: Casual Games in 2025 (summary of the report above; dataset totals cross-checked): https://gamedevreports.substack.com/p/liftoff-and-singular-casual-games
Statista, Click-through-rate (CTR) of gaming apps worldwide from February 2024 to February 2025, by genre and platform, updated 2025-06-17 (iOS casino 6.5%, Android average 3.9%): https://www.statista.com/statistics/1616309/global-ctr-gaming-apps-genre-platform
Singular, Mobile gaming CTR is out of control, 2025-08-13 (iOS game CTR 6.1% in January 2025 to 25.9% in June; iOS overall 4.3% to 13.4%; Android game CTR ~5%, overall Android CTR flat for six months; SKOverlay rewarded ads and accidental taps; "SKAN clicks are not trackable"; Android almost 3x installs per impression): https://www.singular.net/blog/mobile-gaming-ctr/
GameDev Reports, Singular: Trends in Mobile Game Marketing, 2025-07-14 (Android CTR lowest in China, highest in tier 3 markets; figures not published): https://gamedevreports.substack.com/p/singular-trends-in-mobile-game-marketing
Singular, Q1 2026 Quarterly Trends Report landing page (CTR and IPM declined): https://lp.singular.net/q1-2026-quarterly-trends-report
Singular, Q2 2026 Quarterly Trends Report landing page (global IPM -10.5%; global CPI +12.0% to $1.24): https://lp.singular.net/q2-2026-quarterly-trends-report
Superads, Facebook Ads CTR Benchmarks – Gaming ($3B+ ad spend; gaming average ~0.99%, high 1.28% in September 2025, low 0.70% in July 2026; all-industry average ~2.04%): https://www.superads.ai/facebook-ads-costs/ctr-click-through-rate/gaming
App Developer Magazine, SplitMetrics Apple Ads Search Results Benchmarks Report 2025, 2025-05-30 (January to December 2024; 4.4B impressions, 395.4M taps, 253.1M downloads; average TTR 11.4%, CR 67.2%; games CPA $2.00): https://appdevelopermagazine.com/apple-ads-search-results-benchmarks-report-2025/
SplitMetrics, Apple Ads Search Results Benchmarks Report 2026 (sample totals 6.3B impressions, 495.6M taps, 315.6M downloads; the ~7.9% TTR and ~63.7% CR in the text are calculated from these totals): https://splitmetrics.com/apple-ads-search-results-benchmarks-2026/introduction
AppTweak, Average App Conversion Rate per Category [2025], 2026-05-18 (US Google Play 16.15%, App Store 8.56%; installs per store page view): https://www.apptweak.com/aso-blog/average-app-conversion-rate-per-category-2019
Liftoff 2025 Mobile Ad Creative Index press release, 2025-07-07 (4.7T impressions, 263B clicks, 1.1B installs; playable impression-to-install rate 8x non-playable for top spenders, 16x for other game advertisers): https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/liftoff-s-2025-mobile-ad-creative-index-reveals-ugc-is-a-key-differentiator-for-top-apps-837345804.html
MWM, Click-Through Rate glossary (CTR ranges by format, US iOS 2026 anchors; dataset undisclosed): https://mwm.ai/de/glossary/click-through-rate
Adapty, Interstitial Ads in Mobile Apps: Best Practices and Examples, updated 2026-02-15 (interstitial CTR 4–5% on Android, banner 0.1–0.3%; source undisclosed): https://adapty.io/blog/mobile-interstitial-ads/
Yango Ads, Mobile Banner Ads: Formats & Optimization Guide, 2025-10-31 (banner 0.05–0.1%, interstitial 4–5%, native 0.5–1%, rewarded "opt-in based"; source undisclosed): https://yango-ads.com/blog/mobile-banner-ads
Google AdMob Help, Disallowed interstitial implementations (no interstitials on app load or exit, no more than one per two user actions, no unexpected launches during gameplay): https://support.google.com/admob/answer/6201362?hl=en
Google Play Console Help, Ads policy (ads causing inadvertent clicks, unexpected full-screen interstitials, false dismiss buttons prohibited): https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9857753?hl=en
Google AdSense Help, Top invalid traffic and policy violations that lead to account closure (accidental clicks count as invalid traffic; ads placed near heavy-interaction elements prohibited): https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/2660562?hl=en
Deloitte, Deloitte and Google AdMob report, 2025-06-10 (survey of 7,000 gamers; playable ads with disruptive features double the chance a gamer quits): https://www.deloitte.com/us/en/about/press-room/deloitte-improve-mobile-game-advertising.html
Funnel calculation from totals (CTR ~3.3%, click-to-install ~6.7%, IPM ~2.2) and creative A/B example (4% × 5% vs 8% × 2% at a $10 CPM): illustrative calculations