Reference · 96 terms

Growth glossary.

The vocabulary of mobile game growth, defined the way operators use it: what the term measures, how it is calculated, and where it misleads. Each entry links to the tools and field notes that put it to work.

Monetization & ad revenue Ad formats, mediation, bidding, IAP, and the revenue metrics that describe them. 32 terms User acquisition & growth Paid acquisition, bidding strategies, creative, and the economics of scale. 19 terms Attribution & privacy How installs and revenue are attributed, and what privacy frameworks changed. 11 terms Analytics & retention Cohorts, retention, experiments, and the metric systems that drive decisions. 16 terms Game economy & LiveOps Virtual economies, progression, events, and the systems players live inside. 12 terms ASO & store App store optimization, store listing conversion, and organic discovery. 6 terms

A

A/B test · Split test · Experiment
A controlled experiment that randomly splits users between variants to measure the causal effect of a change.
Ad ARPDAU
Ad revenue per daily active user: impressions per DAU multiplied by the effective eCPM, divided by 1,000.
Ad load
How many ads a player is exposed to over a session or day — the intensity of ad monetization and its main retention risk.
Ad mediation · Mediation platform
Software that runs an auction across multiple ad networks for each ad opportunity and serves the winning ad — e.g. AppLovin MAX, Unity LevelPlay, AdMob.
Ad–IAP cannibalization · Ad-to-IAP cannibalization
When ad exposure reduces in-app purchase revenue — by lowering conversion, shortening lifespans, or making the paid experience feel less valuable.
AdAttributionKit
Apple’s newer privacy-preserving ad attribution framework, interoperable with SKAdNetwork and extended to alternative app marketplaces and re-engagement.
app-ads.txt · Authorized Sellers for Apps
A text file an app developer publishes at the root of its website that lists the ad systems authorised to sell the app's ad inventory, so buyers can avoid fake or unauthorised inventory.
Apple Search Ads · ASA · Apple Ads
Apple’s ad platform for promoting apps in App Store search results and other App Store placements, bought on keywords.
ARPDAU · Average revenue per daily active user
Average revenue per daily active user: total revenue on a day divided by that day’s active users — the standard daily yield metric in free-to-play games.
ARPPU · Average revenue per paying user
Average revenue per paying user: revenue divided by the number of users who made at least one purchase in the period.
ARPU · Average revenue per user
Average revenue per user over a period — total revenue divided by the users active (or acquired) in that period.
ASO · App store optimization
App store optimization: improving an app’s visibility and conversion in app store search and browse — metadata, creative, ratings and experiments.
ATT · App Tracking Transparency
App Tracking Transparency: Apple’s framework (since iOS 14.5) requiring apps to ask permission before tracking users across other companies’ apps and sites.
Attribution
Assigning an install or conversion to the marketing touchpoint that caused it — typically last click or view within a lookback window.

B

Banner ad · Banner
A persistent ad strip, usually at the top or bottom of the screen, that refreshes on a timer while the player is in session.
Battle pass · Season pass
A time-limited progression track with free and premium reward tiers; players unlock rewards by playing during a season.
Bid density
The number of bidders actively competing for a given impression — more independent bidders usually means stronger clearing prices.
Blended ROAS
ROAS averaged across all campaigns, markets and cohorts — useful for reporting, but able to stay healthy while the newest spend loses money.
Bookings · Net bookings
The value of transactions with players when they occur — distinct from revenue, which accounting recognises over time.

C

Churn · Churn rate
Users (or subscribers) who stop engaging or paying — the complement of retention over a period.
Cohort
A group of users defined by a shared starting event — usually install date — tracked together over time.
Conversion value · CV · Fine value · Coarse value
The number an iOS app sets to encode post-install behaviour for SKAdNetwork/AdAttributionKit postbacks — fine (0–63) or coarse (low/medium/high).
Country tiers · Tier 1 / Tier 2 / Tier 3
Informal grouping of markets by ad and purchase value — Tier 1 (e.g. US, UK, Japan) through Tier 3 — used to plan UA and read monetization.
CPA · Cost per action · Cost per event · tCPA
Cost per action: spend divided by a chosen in-app event, such as a registration, level completion or first purchase.
CPI · Cost per install
Cost per install: paid media spend divided by the installs it produced.
Creative concentration
When an ad algorithm pushes a large share of spend onto one creative — so that creative’s promise, accurate or not, shapes the whole incoming cohort.
Creative fatigue
The decline in a creative’s performance as the same audience sees it repeatedly — rising CPI or falling conversion over time.
Custom product pages · CPP
Alternative versions of an App Store product page with different screenshots and messaging, each with its own URL for ads or audiences.

D

Data maturity
Whether a cohort’s data is complete and settled enough to support a decision — attribution delays, revenue lag and small samples all make early data immature.
DAU · Daily active users
Daily active users: unique users who opened or engaged with the product on a given day.
DAU/MAU (stickiness) · Stickiness ratio
The ratio of daily to monthly active users — roughly how many days a month the average monthly user returns.
Deferred revenue
Cash or bookings already received for items whose revenue has not yet been recognised — the bridge between bookings and reported revenue.
DSP · Demand-side platform
Demand-side platform: technology advertisers use to buy ad inventory programmatically across many sources.

E

Economy inflation
Rising costs or devalued currency in a game economy as progression deepens or sources outpace sinks.
eCPM · Effective CPM · Revenue per mille
Effective cost per mille: ad revenue earned per 1,000 impressions — the price side of ad monetization.
Effective CAC · eCAC · Blended CAC
Blended customer acquisition cost after counting the organic installs that paid activity generates — paid CPI divided by (1 + organic multiplier).
Energy system · Lives · Stamina
A mechanic that limits how much a player can play in a session, refilling over time or via purchase — both a pacing and a monetization lever.
Event debt
The build-up that happens when live events stop amplifying a game’s core loop and start substituting for it.
Event fatigue
The declining response to repeated LiveOps events as players tire of similar formats or the calendar becomes a chore.

F

Fill rate
The share of ad requests that returned an ad — a diagnostic of the auction, not a measure of how much value it created.
Floor price · Bid floor · Price floor
The minimum price an impression must clear to be sold — a clearing threshold, not a quality filter.

G

Gacha · Loot box · Draws
A randomised reward mechanic where players spend currency on draws for characters or items of varying rarity.
GAID · AAID · Android Advertising ID
Google Advertising ID: Android’s resettable advertising identifier, which users can reset or delete in device settings.
Google App Campaigns · UAC · Google Ads app campaigns
Google’s automated app install and engagement campaigns across Search, Play, YouTube and its display network, optimised by Google’s algorithm to your chosen goal.
Guardrail metric · Counter-metric
A metric an experiment must not damage beyond an agreed threshold, even while it optimises a different primary metric.

H

Hybrid monetization
Combining in-app purchases, ads and sometimes subscriptions in one game, with each value exchange routed to the player moment where it fits.
Hybrid-casual
Games with a simple casual core loop plus meta-progression and IAP, monetized through both ads and purchases.
Hypercasual · Hyper-casual
Very simple, instantly playable mobile games monetized almost entirely by ads, relying on high install volume and low CPI.

I

IAP · In-app purchase
In-app purchase: a transaction inside an app or game, such as currency, items, passes, or removing ads.
IDFA · Identifier for Advertisers
Identifier for Advertisers: Apple’s per-device advertising ID, available to an app only if the user grants tracking permission under ATT.
Impressions per DAU · Imps/DAU
The average number of ad impressions each daily active user sees — the volume side of ad revenue.
In-app bidding · Header bidding · Unified auction
A mediation auction in which ad networks bid simultaneously in real time for each impression, and the highest bid wins.
Incrementality · Incremental lift
The part of a result that would not have happened without the marketing — measured by comparing exposed users with a controlled holdout.
Interstitial ad · IS · Full-screen ad
A full-screen ad shown at a natural break in the experience, such as between levels, that the player did not choose to see.

K

K-factor · Viral coefficient · Organic multiplier
The number of additional users each user brings in — through invites, sharing or paid-driven organic uplift. Above 1, growth is self-sustaining.
Keyword ranking
An app’s position in store search results for a given query — driven by relevance, conversion and engagement signals.
KPI tree · Metric tree · Driver tree
A decomposition of a top-level metric (e.g. revenue) into the driver metrics that produce it, used to find which lever matters most.

L

LiveOps · Live operations · Live ops
Live operations: the ongoing events, offers, content drops and tuning that keep a live game engaging after launch.
LTV · Lifetime value · CLV · pLTV
Lifetime value: the total revenue (or margin) a user is expected to generate over their life in the product.

M

Marginal ROAS · Incremental ROAS · mROAS
The return on the incremental block of spend — what the last budget increase actually bought — as opposed to the average return on all spend.
MAU · Monthly active users
Monthly active users: unique users active at least once in a 30-day (or calendar-month) window.
Meta-progression · Meta layer · Meta game
Long-term progression that persists across sessions or runs — collections, upgrades, bases — layered above the core gameplay loop.
Metrics dictionary · Data dictionary · Metric definitions
The agreed definitions of a team’s metrics — calculation, filters, owner and version — so the same word means the same number everywhere.
Minimum detectable effect · MDE
The smallest true change an experiment is designed to detect reliably, given its sample size, variance, significance level and power.
Mix shift · Simpson's paradox · Composition effect
When a blended metric changes because the composition of users changed — by country, platform or source — rather than because behaviour within any group changed.
MMP · Mobile measurement partner · Attribution provider
Mobile measurement partner: a third-party platform (e.g. AppsFlyer, Adjust, Singular, Branch, Kochava) that attributes installs and events to marketing sources.

N

North Star metric
A single metric chosen to represent the value a product delivers, used to align teams around one measure of progress.

O

Organic uplift · Organic lift · Halo effect · Spillover
The extra organic installs caused by paid activity — via store rankings, search and word of mouth — on top of baseline organic demand.

P

Payback period · CAC payback · Breakeven day
How long it takes a cohort’s cumulative revenue to cover the cost of acquiring it.
Payer conversion · Payer rate · Conversion to payer
The share of users who make at least one purchase in a period or cohort — the breadth side of IAP revenue.
Postback
A server-to-server message reporting an install or event to an ad network or MMP, used for attribution and for optimising campaigns.
Privacy Sandbox (Android)
Google’s initiative to build privacy-preserving advertising and attribution APIs; its scope and timeline have changed several times, so check current status.
Probabilistic attribution · Fingerprinting
Matching installs to ad interactions using statistical signals such as IP address and device attributes rather than a device ID.

R

Ratings and reviews
User star ratings and written reviews on the app stores, which influence both conversion and store visibility.
Retention rate · D1 / D7 / D30 retention
The share of an install cohort that returns on a given day after install — D1, D7, D30 — the core health metric for games and apps.
Revenue per eligible opportunity
Ad revenue divided by every moment an ad could have been requested — the metric that shows whether mediation changes created value, not just fill.
Rewarded video · RV · Rewarded ad
An opt-in video ad the player chooses to watch in exchange for an in-game reward such as extra moves, currency or a revive.
ROAS · Return on ad spend
Return on ad spend: revenue from a cohort of acquired users divided by the spend that acquired them, measured at a given day (D7, D30, D180…).

S

Scale ceiling
The spend level beyond which additional acquisition no longer earns an acceptable return — set by audience, creative and the product’s ability to hold marginal users.
sellers.json
A file an ad system publishes that lists the sellers it represents and whether each is a publisher or an intermediary, so buyers can trace who is selling an impression.
Show rate · Render rate
The share of filled ads that were actually displayed to the player — the gap between an ad being ready and an impression happening.
Sinks and sources · Currency sinks · Faucets and sinks
The flows of a virtual economy: sources create currency or resources (rewards, drops); sinks remove them (upgrades, purchases, consumables).
SKAdNetwork · SKAN
Apple’s privacy-preserving attribution API: it reports installs and limited post-install value to ad networks without identifying the user.
Soft launch
Releasing a game in a few test markets before global launch to validate retention, monetization and UA economics.
Spend depth
How much a committed player can meaningfully spend before the game runs out of valuable things to buy — the ceiling on high-end monetization.
SSP · Supply-side platform
Supply-side platform: technology that sells a publisher’s ad inventory to many buyers through programmatic auctions.
Starter pack
A discounted first-purchase offer designed to convert a non-payer into a payer, usually shown early in the player’s life.
Statistical power · Power
The probability that an experiment detects a true effect of at least the MDE — commonly set at 80% or 90%.
Store conversion rate · Store CVR · Page conversion
The share of store page visitors (or impressions) who install — the storefront’s efficiency at turning attention into installs.
Store listing experiments · Product page optimization · PPO
Native A/B tests of store assets — Google Play store listing experiments and Apple’s product page optimization — run on live store traffic.

T

tROAS · Target ROAS · Value optimisation
Target ROAS bidding: an ad-platform strategy that bids to hit a target return on spend, using predicted purchase or ad value.

U

UA cash runway
How long a studio can sustain a given acquisition spend before delayed payback drains its cash — the working-capital side of UA.
User acquisition · UA · Paid acquisition · Performance marketing
Paid marketing to acquire new users — through ad networks, self-serve platforms, influencers and other channels — measured against the value those users create.

W

Waterfall
A mediation method that calls ad networks one after another in a fixed priority order, each with a price floor, until one fills.
Web shop · DTC store · Direct-to-consumer store · Webstore
A direct-to-consumer store on the web where players buy in-game items outside the app stores, typically at a lower payment cost.
Whale · High spender · VIP
Industry slang for a top-spending player. Spending in games is heavily skewed, so a small group often drives a large share of IAP revenue.
Calculator by The Game Scientist ↗