Top 10 Grossing Sub-Genres & Their Olygopoly Index (2025)

While monetary value is an important factor when choosing a sub-genre to enter, don’t overlook entry barriers — one of which is how monopolized the market is 🏆

A useful indicator here is the Oligopoly Index — the market share held by the top 5 games. The higher the index, the harder it is for new titles to break through 🥊

To speed things up for you, we’ve compiled a list of the top 10 grossing sub-genres in 2025 along with their Oligopoly Index:

1️⃣ 4X Strategy
iAP revenue (2025): $3.8B
Olygopoly index: 50,67%
Leading titles: Last War: Survival, Whiteout Survival
Top games

2️⃣ Match-3
iAP revenue (2025): $2.5B
Olygopoly index: 71,22%
Leading titles: Royal Match, Candy Crush Saga, Gardenscapes
Top games

3️⃣ Team Battler
iAP revenue (2025): $1.9B
Olygopoly index: 35,76%
Leading titles: Honkai: Star Rail, Fate/Grand Order (English), DRAGON BALL Z DOKKAN BATTLE
Top games

4️⃣ Slots
iAP revenue (2025): $1.5B
Olygopoly index: 25,34%
Leading titles: Lightning Link Casino Slots, Jackpot Party - Casino Slots, DoubleDown™ Casino Vegas Slots
Top games

5️⃣ MMORPG
iAP revenue (2025): $1.4B
Olygopoly index: 23,58%
Leading titles: Fantasy Westward Journey (梦幻西游), Lineage M (리니지M), Justice Online (逆水寒)
Top games

6️⃣ MOBA
iAP revenue (2025): $1.2B
Olygopoly index: 98,36%
Leading titles: Honor of Kings
Top games

7️⃣ Casual Casino
iAP revenue (2025): $1.1B
Olygopoly index: 96,28%
Leading titles: MONOPOLY GO!, Coin Master
Top games

8️⃣ Battle Royale
iAP revenue (2025): $1B
Olygopoly index: 95,61%
Leading titles: PUBG MOBILE, Free Fire
Top games

9️⃣ Idle RPG
iAP revenue (2025): $0.9B
Olygopoly index: 26,55%
Leading titles: Capybara Go!, Legend of Mushroom, Heroes don't have flash (英雄没有闪)
Top games

🔟 Merge
iAP revenue (2025): $0.8B
Olygopoly index: 65,86%
Leading titles: Gossip Harbor, Travel Town, Seaside Escape, Merge Mansion
Top games