Japanese adults in their 20s who pay for in-game items and gacha spent an average of ¥5,080 a month in SMBC Consumer Finance’s November 2025 survey, up from ¥4,247 nine months earlier. The share paying anything fell to 19.2%. Fewer payers, bigger bills. Below: what the survey found, how mobile RPG revenue moved in 2025, and where gacha money actually lands inside a game.
Gacha Game Spending
How Much Do Players Spend On Gacha Games In Japan?
SMBC Consumer Finance surveys 1,000 Japanese adults aged 20 to 29 on money habits, including a direct question on paying for in-game items and gacha. The 2026 wave was fielded online on 27 and 28 November 2025.
Participation dropped 2.4 points while the average monthly bill among payers rose ¥833. Amounts are shown in yen because the two waves were converted at very different exchange rates.
| Metric | Feb 2025 wave | Nov 2025 wave |
|---|---|---|
| Paid for in-game items or gacha | 21.6% | 19.2% |
| Average monthly spend among payers | ¥4,247 | ¥5,080 |
| Men who paid | 28.2% | 25.6% |
| Women who paid | 15.0% | 12.8% |
Source: SMBC Consumer Finance, Attitude Survey on Money Sense Among People in Their 20s 2026; n=1,000 per wave, monthly averages based on payers only (n=216 in February 2025, n=192 in November 2025)
Four in five respondents paid nothing at all. That split is the single clearest fact in gacha game spending data, and it holds across both waves. For the wider market these players sit inside, the mobile game market breakdown covers downloads and revenue together.
Gacha Game Spending By Gender
Men remain roughly twice as likely to pay at all. Among people who do pay, women’s monthly average rose ¥1,274 to ¥5,118 while men’s rose ¥600 to ¥5,061.
The female figure rests on 64 respondents, so treat it as a small-sample reading rather than a settled trend.
| Group | Feb 2025 wave | Nov 2025 wave | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| All payers | ¥4,247 | ¥5,080 | +¥833 |
| Men | ¥4,461 | ¥5,061 | +¥600 |
| Women | ¥3,844 | ¥5,118 | +¥1,274 |
Source: SMBC Consumer Finance, Attitude Survey on Money Sense Among People in Their 20s 2026; payers only, n=141 men and n=75 women in February 2025, n=128 men and n=64 women in November 2025
How Many Players Regret Gacha Spending?
SMBC asks two follow-up questions of all 1,000 respondents, not just payers. Both outcomes skew male by a wide margin.
Regret runs at 25.2% among men against 12.4% among women. Financial difficulty from overspending runs at 13.2% and 7.8%.
On attitudes, 30.8% said landing a rare item or character makes them feel proud, and 20.6% said games are no fun without paying. Only 13.2% said they want to pay to get ahead.
Gacha Game Spending Against Other Discretionary Spending
Gacha no longer leads Japanese youth spending on fandom. Supporting a favourite performer or character, known as oshikatsu, drew both more participants and more money in the November 2025 wave.
| Category | Share spending | Monthly average among spenders |
|---|---|---|
| Oshikatsu (fan support) | 35.3% | ¥12,150 |
| Subscription services | 43.3% | ¥1,779 |
| In-game items and gacha | 19.2% | ¥5,080 |
Source: SMBC Consumer Finance, Attitude Survey on Money Sense Among People in Their 20s 2026, fielded 27–28 November 2025, n=1,000
Where Does Gacha Game Spending Sit In Mobile RPG Revenue?
Mobile RPGs generated $9.8 billion in in-app purchase revenue in 2025 on 1.36 billion downloads, ranking third by genre behind strategy at $14 billion and puzzle at $10 billion.
Inside the genre, MMORPG led on revenue and survival led on growth. Every subgenre except survival and open world adventure lost revenue year over year.
| RPG subgenre | 2025 downloads | 2025 revenue | Revenue change |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMORPG | 213M | $2.8B | −13% |
| Turn-based RPG | 94.8M | $2.1B | −6% |
| Idle RPG | 221M | $1.48B | −14% |
| Squad RPG | 218M | $1.41B | −13% |
| Puzzle RPG | 74M | $987M | −23% |
| Open world adventure | 70M | $775M | +12% |
| Survival | 367M | $159M | +81% |
| Action RPG | 99.8M | $154M | −25% |
Source: Sensor Tower data published by Mistplay, February 2026; full-year 2025 iOS App Store and Google Play downloads and in-app purchase revenue
Mistplay also reports 4.91% of RPG installs on Android and 5.04% on iOS make a purchase within 30 days, with a first purchase arriving 1.7 days after install. Those benchmarks come from Mistplay platform data alongside a 2025 survey of more than 500 RPG players. Title-level context sits in the HoYoverse revenue tracker.
Gacha Game Spending By Country
Japan produced the most mobile RPG revenue of any market in 2025 on the fourth-largest download base. It also posted the steepest decline of the top four.
| Market | 2025 downloads | 2025 revenue | Revenue change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japan | 69M | $2.6B | −17% |
| China | 401M | $1.7B | −14% |
| South Korea | 79M | $1.7B | −5% |
| United States | 122M | $1.4B | −6% |
| Taiwan | 38M | $612M | −9% |
| Germany | 19M | $178M | −11% |
| France | 19M | $116M | −13% |
| United Kingdom | 14M | $111M | −0.4% |
| Canada | 11M | $111M | −7% |
Source: Sensor Tower data published by Mistplay, February 2026; full-year 2025 iOS App Store and Google Play figures, China iOS only
China posts 401 million downloads against $1.7 billion, while Japan turns 69 million downloads into $2.6 billion. Per-market pricing and payer depth explain more of gacha game spending than install counts do. Similar geography-versus-revenue gaps show up in the Genshin Impact country data and in NetEase’s publisher figures.
What Share Of Gacha Revenue Comes From Pulls?
AppMagic broke down where 2025 in-app purchase revenue came from in three large gacha titles. The split is not uniform.
Paid-only currency packs, the classic route to funding pulls, made up 82% of Genshin Impact’s 2025 revenue and more than 74% of Honkai: Star Rail’s. In Love and Deepspace the same packs accounted for roughly 11%.
Love and Deepspace routes the money through events instead. Time-limited event packs plus store packs delivered 60% of the game’s total revenue, while a premium pass and monthly subscription together contributed over 7% of annual revenue.
AppMagic places the title one spot outside the top 10 grossing midcore games of 2025 and at number 9 by in-app purchase revenue in China, up from number 10 in its launch year.
How Gacha Game Spending Compares To The Wider Mobile Market
Mobile games took $81.8 billion in in-app purchase revenue across the App Store and Google Play in 2025, a rise of about 1%. Non-game apps took $85.6 billion, up 21%, passing games for the first time.
Downloads went the other way. Mobile game installs fell 7.0% to 50 billion, leaving $1.62 of in-app purchase revenue per download, and 96% of those downloads were free-to-play.
Asia is where the genre shift bit hardest. RPG in-app purchase revenue there fell $1.53 billion in 2025, the largest single genre drop in any region, while strategy added $1.38 billion.
Sensor Tower describes 2025 monetisation as leaning less on routine offers and more on mechanic-led formats including gacha and multi-pass systems. Its analysts also tested offer walls in Gossip Harbor across three accounts: a non-paying one, a dolphin that had spent $51, and a whale that had spent $113. The whale account saw a higher density of offers.
On price ceilings, most reviewed titles capped single offers near $100. Total Battle listed one at $249.99, and Cash Tornado and DoubleU Casino each surfaced $299.99 store items. For platform-level comparisons, see the mobile versus console revenue split and the whole-industry revenue overview.
FAQ
How much do people spend on gacha games each month?
Japanese adults aged 20 to 29 who pay averaged ¥5,080 a month in SMBC Consumer Finance’s November 2025 survey, up from ¥4,247 in February 2025. Only 19.2% of the 1,000 respondents paid anything.
Do Reddit’s gacha whale estimates match published data?
No public dataset splits gacha players into whale and dolphin tiers. The closest verified figures come from SMBC’s survey of 1,000 Japanese 20-somethings, which reports averages among payers rather than spend tiers.
Which country spends the most on mobile RPGs?
Japan, at $2.6 billion in 2025 in-app purchase revenue on 69 million downloads. China and South Korea followed at $1.7 billion each, per Sensor Tower data published by Mistplay in February 2026.
Is gacha game spending falling?
RPG in-app purchase revenue in Asia fell $1.53 billion during 2025, the largest genre decline in any region. Mobile game revenue overall still rose about 1%, reaching $81.8 billion.
Why do Reddit threads say banners drive most gacha revenue?
AppMagic found time-limited event packs and store packs supplied 60% of Love and Deepspace’s revenue in 2025. A premium pass and monthly subscription together added more than 7% of annual revenue.
Sources
https://www.smbc-cf.com/news/data/2026/01/news_20260115.pdf
https://sensortower.com/blog/state-of-gaming-2026
https://business.mistplay.com/resources/rpg-mobile-game-trends
https://appmagic.rocks/research/love-and-deepspace-monetization