Productivity software was some of the first software developed for PCs, with the earliest word processors, spreadsheet editors and database management software predating the introduction of the graphical user interface.
Forty-five years on, productivity apps have broadened their market. From being purely business tools in the early 1980s, productivity apps are now used by millions in a personal capacity, for note taking, safe search, and as an interface to chat to AI.
Productivity on mobile is a broad category, filled with applications primarily imported from the PC and web. For that reason, most office suites and other productivity tools moved to cloud-based saving systems, to allow users to shift from mobile to PC with the same document, without having to save and send to another device.
This has been hugely beneficial to companies like Google, Microsoft and Apple, which have opened up a new revenue stream from users willing to pay for cloud storage to store their photos, videos, documents and back-up their device. It is expected that this market generated over $12 billion revenue in 2024.
The newest productivity market to open up is generative AI, which gained a huge amount of users in 2023 with the growth of ChatGPT. Over 800 million people access generative AI chatbots every week, with many using them to assist on work projects, learning and as a replacement to search.
We have collected data and statistics on productivity apps. Read on below to find out more.
Key Productivity App Statistics
- Productivity apps brought in $32.5 billion revenue in 2024, primarily through office suite and AI apps
- Office suite apps generated $19 billion revenue in 2024, primarily from cloud storage solutions offered
- AI apps generated $4.5 billion in 2024, more than double the previous year
- Microsoft Teams was the most used business communications app, with over 300 million users
- Gmail is the most popular email app with 1.8 billion users, Apple Mail is second with 650 million users
- AI apps had almost one billion users in 2025, the majority use ChatGPT
- Trello was the most subscribed to task management app, with 400,000 subscribers
- Notion had the most downloads of all to-do list apps, with 18 million downloads
- Google Calendar was the most installed calendar app in 2024 by a factor of three
Top Productivity Apps
| App Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| https://workspace.google.com/intl/en_uk/products/drive/ | Google Drive | Google's office suite includes the traditional productivity tools such as a word processor, presentation and spreadsheet tools, alongside cloud storage |
| https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365 | Microsoft 365 | The dominate office suite for decades, 365 includes Word, PowerPoint and Excel, alongside Outlook and other productivity software |
| https://www.apple.com/uk/iwork/ | iWork | Less popular among both enterprise and consumers, Apple's office suite includes Pages, Keynote and Numbers |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/gmail-email-by-google/id422689480 | Gmail | The most popular email service worldwide, Gmail is the default email app for around two billion users |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/microsoft-outlook/id951937596 | Outlook | Microsoft Outlook is still broadly popular and is still preferred by many businesses |
| https://www.businessofapps.com/data/chatgpt-statistics/ | ChatGPT | The current leader in the chatbot market, very quickly approaching over one billion users |
| https://www.businessofapps.com/data/google-gemini-statistics/ | Google Gemini | ChatGPT's main competitor, operated by the dominant search provider for the last decade |
| https://www.businessofapps.com/data/microsoft-teams-statistics/ | Microsoft Teams | One of the most popular business communication apps worldwide, bundled with Office 365 |
| https://www.businessofapps.com/data/zoom-statistics/ | Zoom | The biggest winner of the coronavirus pandemic, rocketing to 300 million daily active participants |
| https://www.businessofapps.com/data/slack-statistics/ | Slack | Popular business communication tool for small teams, owned by Salesforce |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/todoist-to-do-list-calendar/id572688855 | Todolist | One of the original task management apps, offering a simple UI to manage tasks |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/notion-notes-tasks-ai/id1232780281 | Notion | Another popular tool with small teams, used for workspace collaboration and notes |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/google-keep-notes-and-lists/id1029207872 | Google Keep | A simplistic note taking app from Google, which is a popular widget on Android |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/structured-daily-planner/id1499198946 | Structured | A newer app on the block that combines tasks and to-dos on one platform |
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/evernote-notes-organizer/id281796108 | Evernote | One of the OG note taking apps, which has been built into a productivity platform for consumer, student and business users |
Productivity App Market Landscape
The productivity app industry spans a large amount of subsections and services, from your typical office suite fair of word processors, powerpoint and spreadsheet tools to newer apps such as note-taking, to-do lists and generative AI. Security software, in the form of VPNs, antivirus and password management tools, are also in this section. You can download this map as a PDF, for presentations and slides.
Productivity App Revenue
Productivity apps generated over $30 billion revenue in 2024, an increase of 17.3% on the previous year.
Productivity app revenue 2018 to 2024 ($bn)
Office Suite App Revenue
Office suites, which include word processors, presentation, spreadsheet tools and cloud storage apps, generated $19 billion in 2024. We are only looking at personal office suite usage in this chart, which accounts for about 10% of total office suite revenue.
Office suite app revenue 2018 to 2024 ($bn)
AI App Revenue
AI apps generated $4.5 billion revenue in 2024 and that is expected to more than triple in 2025.
AI app revenue 2021 to 2024 ($bn)
Communication Users by App
Microsoft Teams is the most popular communications app on the market, but Google Meet is not far behind it.
Communication users by app 2024 (mm)
Email Users by App
Gmail is far ahead of other email apps in terms of users, with 1.8 billion to the nearest, Apple Mail, with 650 million users. Gmail is also the most popular email domain in the world.
Email users by app 2024 (mm)
AI App Users
There are close to one billion AI users worldwide, with the majority using either ChatGPT or Google Gemini.
AI app users 2022 to 2025 (mm)
Task Management App Subscribers
Trello has the most app subscribers of all the lightweight task management apps available, with an estimated 400,000 subscribers.
Task management app subscribers 2024 (K)
To-do List Downloads by App
Notion was the most popular to-do list app, although its primary use may be more for note-taking. Google Keep and Google Tasks were both popular choices in 2024.
To-do list downloads by app 2024 (mm)
Calendar Downloads by App
Even with Google Calendar coming preinstalled on most Android devices, it is still the most installed calendar app by far.
