Figures with a publisher behind them
Each of these names the report it came from, its edition and what it actually measures.
- Impression to install, top spenders
8 times the rate of non-playable formats, for the game advertisers spending most.Source: Liftoff, 2025 Mobile Ad Creative Index, published 7 July 2025
- Impression to install, everyone else
16 times the rate of non-playable formats, for the other game advertisers in the same dataset.Source: Liftoff, 2025 Mobile Ad Creative Index
- What that dataset is
Over 4.7 trillion impressions, 263 billion clicks and 1.1 billion installs, from January 2023 to the end of May 2025. The seventh annual edition.Source: Liftoff, 2025 Mobile Ad Creative Index, methodology
- Spend share
The share of spend going to playables at top games averaged 35% higher than at other games.Source: Liftoff, 2025 Mobile Ad Creative Index
- Share of game ad impressions
Playables grew from 6.3% of mobile game ad creative in 2024 to 13.3% in 2025, roughly doubling in a year.Source: Sensor Tower, State of Gaming 2026, as reported rather than read first hand
- Where playable traffic sits
Split roughly 59% AppLovin, 38% AdMob and 2% Unity Ads by playable traffic share.Source: Apptica data, quoted in AppAgent’s state of playable ads review
Figures with no publisher behind them
These four are quoted constantly, including by tools that sell playables. We went looking for the dataset behind each and did not find one.
4.8 installs per thousand impressions, against 2.9 for video
The most repeated playable statistic there is. The sites printing it name no dataset, and the report it gets attributed to measures something else entirely: a ratio against non-playable formats, not an install rate. One site that helped spread it has since pulled the figure and said the report does not exist.
A 15.4 day creative lifespan, against 9.2 for video
Travels alongside the figure above and has the same problem. No publisher, no dataset, no method. Creative fatigue is real and worth measuring in your own account; this particular pair of numbers is not evidence of it.
A 5% to 15% playable click-through rate
No publisher states this range. It is also the least useful metric for the format, because networks differ on what counts as a click on a playable, so the same creative can report wildly different rates.
Playable IPM of 10.3, 14.9 or 24
These appear in prompts and summaries attributed to a Unity or Liftoff report. They are in neither. The Liftoff Creative Index editions we read contain no such figures.
How to read the real ones
The 8 and 16 times figures are solid and routinely misquoted. They are network ratios, not the lift you get from converting a video into a playable.
They pool whole campaigns on one network, which means they compare advertisers who bought playables with advertisers who bought other formats. Studios that buy playables are already the ones with the creative budget, the testing discipline and the genres that demo well. Some of that 8 times is the format and some of it is the advertiser.
The direction of the gap is the interesting part. Playables beat non-playable formats by more for smaller advertisers, 16 times against 8, which is the opposite of what a pure format effect would do. Read it as a format that is hardest to beat when your video is weak.
Cost figures move the other way and are worth knowing. Earlier editions of the same index put playable cost per install well below video for gaming, and playable day-7 return on ad spend below native and banner, so the format buys installs cheaply without being the best return in the account. Pull the edition rather than the summary, because the format rankings genuinely switch between years.
The only benchmark that settles anything is your own. Ship one playable against your best video on the same network, same budget, same week, and compare installs per impression and day-7 revenue. One test beats every figure on this page, including the real ones.
What the top spenders actually ship
If 35% more of the top studios’ spend goes to playables, these are the creatives that spend buys. Play them.
PlayableMonopoly GO“Board, published by Scopely, Inc.”Board, among the biggest playable buyers
PlayableFarmville 3“Strategy / simulation / RPG, published by Zynga Inc.”Simulation, one harvest loop
PlayableDisney Solitaire“Cards / casino, published by SuperPlay”Cards, a licensed casual title
PlayableShadow Legends“Strategy / simulation / RPG, published by Plarium Global Ltd”RPG, one fight as the whole demo
Video ads, every week
Whatever the playable does, the account still needs a stream of video around it.
Director by Sprites is a full creative team for your startup, in private beta. Every Monday you get finished, on-brand video ads, reviewed by a human.
Strategy, hooks, scripts, shooting and editing, end to end. You never write a prompt. You pick the winners. Sprites ships the campaigns.
Every video is checked by a person before it reaches your inbox. No endless revisions.
Questions
What is a good IPM for a playable ad?
No publisher states an absolute playable install-per-mille benchmark that holds up. The figures that circulate are either ratios against other formats or have no dataset behind them, so measure your own against your best video.
Do playable ads really get 4.8 IPM against 2.9 for video?
There is no traceable source for that pair of numbers. The sites repeating it name no dataset, and the report it is attributed to measures impression-to-install ratios against non-playable formats instead.
How much better do playable ads convert?
Liftoff put playable impression-to-install rates at 8 times non-playable formats for the biggest game spenders and 16 times for other game advertisers, across 4.7 trillion impressions from 2023 to mid-2025. Those are network ratios rather than a same-creative lift.
Are playable ads cheaper than video?
Per install, earlier editions of the same index put playables well below video for gaming apps. Per creative they cost far more to build, which what a playable ad costs goes through.
Keep going
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