Fueled by nostalgia, peer pressure, and curiosity, Pokémon Go—which launched in the US, Australia, and New Zealand last week—is taking the world by storm.
Within one day of its American release, the game was installed on 5.16 percent of Android devices, according to SimilarWeb. And though that number be but little, it is fierce: As of July 7, Pokémon Go was "already installed on more US Android phones than Tinder," SimilarWeb says.
Unsurprisingly, app engagement is incredibly high, as well. SimilarWeb reported that more than 60 percent of people in the US who downloaded the app use it daily. That means about 3 percent of US Android users chasing Pokémon characters every day. "In a few more days, Pokémon GO will likely have more users Daily Active Users than" Twitter.
Nintendo's breakaway hit, meanwhile, is being played for an average 43 minutes every day—higher than WhatsApp, Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook Messenger.
Those numbers represent just a fraction of the world's interest: Outside the official launch countries, global users are downloading Pokémon Go using an APK. Since the app's release, traffic to apkmirror.com "absolutely exploded," SimilarWeb said, tipping more than 4 million visits on July 6.
Nearly 20 percent of desktop search traffic between June 10 and July 7 came from the search term "pokemon go apk," according to SimilarWeb's Digital Insights and Content Manager Joseph Schwartz.
The US accounted for about 11 percent of the site's desktop traffic over the last 28 days, Schwartz said. But gamers in Brazil, Germany, Italy, and Turkey also show great interest in downloading the title.
"With only a few days of data, Pokémon Go has an extremely high app retention rate," Schwartz wrote in a blog post. "This is great news for the app, especially considering that users often decide within the first [three to seven] days whether or not they will uninstall a particular app."
It is also great news for game maker Nintendo, which saw a 20 percent surge in its stock, and the best one-day move since 1983.
Pokémon Go's popularity, however, has overloaded the game; some players had difficulty logging in due to overloaded servers. The issues became so troublesome that developer Niantic paused its international rollout in an effort to boost capacity.
For more, check out The 19 Most Ridiculous Places to Catch 'Em All.