Gaming apps and websites see usage rise to 16.6 million Australians
23 May 2024 – During April, breaking news events both locally and globally captured the attention of Australians across news websites and apps, reinforcing that digital websites and apps are an essential go to source for the big stories that impact the lives of Australians.
The series of breaking news stories surrounding the Westfield Bondi Junction and Western Sydney church stabbings saw audiences flock to news sources for “on the ground” reporting. These tragic events saw Sydney-based news outlets of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Daily Telegraph record online audience increases of around 1 million, the highest ever audiences for these two news brands since Ipsos iris launched in 2023.
Other major news events including the Bruce Lehrmann defamation verdict and Seven Network Sunrise reporter Nathan Templeton found dead drove readers to online news websites and apps in April, as well as global events including the Iran drone attack on Israel, and King Charles’ and Kate Middleton’s cancer updates.
More than 20.7 million people used a news website or app in April, reaching 96.6% of online Australians aged 14+. The chart below shows the News brands’ ranking during April 2024 by online audience size.
Ipsos iris, Australia’s digital audience measurement currency endorsed by IAB Australia, showed that overall, 21.5 million Australians aged 14+ used the internet in April and spent on average 4.5 hours per day, or almost 137 hours in the month, online.
The most consumed website and app categories in February were search engines (21.3 million), social networking (21.3 million), technology (21.3 million), retail and commerce (21 million) and entertainment (21 million).
While most category audience numbers remained steady compared to the previous month of March, the gaming category rose by +2.7% and travel was up +2.5%.
Lifestyle websites and apps also saw a significant increase in average time spent per person online for the month, up by 8.3%, with Australians consuming 5.17 minutes more on average than the previous month.
Gamer nation
Gaming on websites and apps was popular during April, with audiences rising by 2.7% on the month prior, which equates to almost 16.6 million Australians aged 14+. Men aged 14 to 24 are driving the increase in games app and website usage, up +10.2% compared to March. The other two groups with significant increases in games app and website usage in April were men aged 65+, rising by +9.1%, and women aged 40-54, up +7.3%.
The chart below shows the changes in audience by age and gender in April compared to March for the Games category.
Ipsos iris, which officially launched in March 2023, provides accurate data about the 20.7 million Australians aged 14+ who access a wide variety of digital content and services across smartphone, PC/laptop and tablet devices.
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