ChatGPT app tops $2B since 2023 leaving rivals far behind

ChatGPT’s mobile app has hit a major mark with $2 billion in consumer spending worldwide since its debut in May 2023, according to new estimates from Appfigures.

The firm says that total is about 30 times the combined lifetime mobile spending of rivals Claude, Copilot, and Grok.

This year alone, the iOS and Android app has brought in $1.35 billion through July, a 673% jump from the $174 million recorded over January to July 2024. Average monthly spending now sits near $193 million, up from roughly $25 million a month last year.

Competitors are far behind. Grok, the closest of the group, has taken in about $25.6 million so far in 2025. Its monthly consumer spending averages an estimated $3.6 million, equal to 1.9% of ChatGPT’s.

These tallies reflect only mobile app store sales. They don’t include subscriptions bought on the web or other revenue, such as money from APIs used by companies and developers. Even so, the numbers offer a look at how consumers are finding and paying for AI assistants on their phones.

Grok arrived later than ChatGPT, launching in November 2023. At first, it was part of X, not as a stand-alone app. Grok released its own iOS app in early January 2025 and landed on Google Play on March 4.

Appfigures also looked at what users spend per download over the apps’ lifetimes. ChatGPT stands at $2.91 globally, compared with $2.55 for Claude, $0.75 for Grok, and $0.28 for Copilot.

The U.S. is ChatGPT’s most valuable market

In U.S. ChatGPT’s spending per download reaches $10, and the country makes up 38% of the app’s total revenue to date. Germany is second, with a 5.3% share.

ChatGPT also leads on installs. It has an estimated 690 million lifetime downloads worldwide, versus 39.5 million for Grok. These numbers are the reason behing the complaints from X owner Elon Musk about the App Store’s charts and ChatGPT’s position there.

Musk  has threatened legal action, alleging Apple has made it “impossible” for apps to compete with OpenAI on the store. He also called OpenAI CEO Sam Altman a “liar” after Altman said Musk uses his platform to “benefit himself and his own companies.”

Apple has rejected Elon Musk’s claims that the App Store suppresses competition, saying it is “designed to be free and fair of bias.”

In 2025 so far, the app has been installed 318 million times, or 2.8 times the 113 million seen in the same period last year. By installs, India ranks first with 13.7% of lifetime downloads, while the U.S. holds second with 10.3%.

As reported by Cryptopolitan just a week ago, Sam Altman played down Elon Musk in a live TV appearance, saying he barely thinks about him, just hours after OpenAI’s system beat Musk’s Grok in a chess tournament.

Speaking on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Altman was asked about Musk’s latest criticism of OpenAI and replied, “You know, I don’t think about him that much.” He added “I thought he was just, like, tweeting all day [on X] about how much OpenAI sucks, and our model is bad, and, you know, [we’re] not gonna be a good company and all that.”

The exchange followed an announcement a day earlier from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella that OpenAI’s newest model, GPT-5, will be built into Microsoft 365 Copilot, GitHub Copilot, Azure AI Foundry, and the standalone Copilot. Musk answered on X with a prediction that “OpenAI is going to eat Microsoft alive.”

Nadella replied, “People have been trying for 50 years, and that’s the fun of it! Each day you learn something new, and innovate, partner, and compete.” He also gave a nod to Musk’s Grok 4 chatbot, noting it is already on Azure in a limited preview.

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