Meta-owned Facebook is struggling to maintain its position among the Top 10 apps on the US App Store this year.
The demand for Facebook is diminishing as younger consumers are shifting to newer social networking experiences like TikTok and BeReal.
Last year, Facebook only fell out of the Top 10 free iPhone apps in the US seven times. In 2022, the drop in its position in the Top 10 free iPhone apps has already soared to 97 — an indication that Facebook may be losing ground as new apps push their way into the App Store’s top rankings.
For a more direct comparison, Facebook’s app fell out of the App Store’s Top 10 apps six times in the first half of 2021. In the first half of 2022, however, Facebook’s app has dropped out of this grouping a total of 59 times, according to a news report in TechCrunch — based on the analysis by app intelligence firm Sensor Tower.
Facebook once stayed out of the Top 10 for as long as 37 consecutive days in 2022, up from just two consecutive days in 2021.
Analysis provided by another App Store data provider, data.ai supported this conclusion — though it found the Facebook app dropped out of the Top 10 on iPhone in the US only 4 times throughout 2021, compared with 110 days in 2022 so far.
It found Facebook’s drop-off times this year were mainly concentrated in April, May and June. April was Facebook’s worst month so far, as the app’s rank fell into the 30s on April 18, and then reached as low as No. 44 on April 21.
Notably, this was around when BeReal was climbing the App Store’s Top Charts, breaking into the Top 5.
Currently, BeReal is the No. 1 non-gaming app on the US App Store.
Worldwide app installations reached 37 billion on the App Store and Google Play during the first quarter of 2022, according to Sensor Tower released in April.
TikTok has exceeded 3.5 billion downloads, becoming the fifth app to cross this threshold. Instagram’s installations were down by 7 percent quarter-over-quarter; however, it was still the app’s second best total since at least 2014.
