Vungle / Liftoff Earnings for Utility App Apps

Typical ad setup for this category

These are the modelling defaults for the category, used in every table on this page.

Sessions per user per day

2.0

Typical session length

2 minutes

Retention day 1 / 7 / 30

25% / 10% / 5%

Typical iOS share

30%

Rewarded video

Off by default

Interstitial

1 per user / day

Banner

4 per session

Native

2 per user / day

App open

Not offered

Utility apps must earn without slowing the task

People open a scanner, torch, file manager, unit converter or VPN to do one job and then close it. Visits are brief and purposeful, and the user judges the app on how quickly it gets out of the way. There is no level to finish and no reward economy to lean on, which helps explain why utilities come in at 0.9 of the baseline in our model. The ad space is real, but much of the attention it captures is spent waiting for a file to save or a connection to start.

App open ads suit this category better than most, because a loading moment is already a pause the user expects. Native units sit comfortably inside lists of files, scan history or saved items. Rewarded video can unlock an occasional premium action, such as one extra high-resolution export or a short break from a usage limit, which feels fair to people who will never subscribe. Interstitials are the risky format. One that lands between the user and the result they came for, such as a finished scan or a converted file, reads as the app holding their work hostage.

Competition adds pressure. Most utilities have dozens of near-identical rivals one search away, so a review complaining about intrusive ads costs installs directly. Store rules also forbid ads that appear outside the app or imitate system notifications, and breaking them can get an app removed, which ends its income entirely. The formats overview sets out how each unit earns and how users tend to react to it.

Estimated monthly earnings by audience size

Monthly estimates for the typical setup above, balanced region split.

Where the money comes from

Split of the $2,222 estimate at 10,000 daily users (blended Android and iOS).

Interstitial carries 40% of the total, so its placement and frequency matter most for this category.

Region makes the biggest difference

The same app at 10,000 daily users with three audience splits:

Moving from an emerging-market audience to a Tier 1 audience multiplies the estimate by about 2.4.

Revenue per install

Using the category’s typical retention curve, one install produces about 3.5 active days in its first 30 days and 5.7 in 90 days.

Ad revenue per install, first 30 days

$0.03

Ad revenue per install, first 90 days

$0.04

Compare these figures with your cost per install before buying users. They exclude in-app purchases.

How Vungle / Liftoff fits this category

For Interstitial, the Tier 1 eCPM in our Vungle / Liftoff table is $8.20, close to the middle of the eight mobile networks. For Banner, the Tier 1 eCPM in our Vungle / Liftoff table is $0.70, about 15% below the middle of the eight mobile networks. For Native, the Tier 1 eCPM in our Vungle / Liftoff table is $3.20, about 4% below the middle of the eight mobile networks. Vungle / Liftoff does not offer App open in our model. On networks that do, it carries about 19% of revenue for this category, so that share has to come from other formats here. Modelled fill is 80% for Vungle / Liftoff against an average of 83% across the mobile networks, which trims a little from every format.

Sign up on the publisher side of Liftoff, register each app and create placements for the formats you plan to use. Most developers add Vungle through their mediation platform rather than integrating it alone, which means copying the app ID and placement IDs into that dashboard and installing the matching adapter. Add the app-ads.txt line Liftoff provides, run test mode until ads load reliably, and complete the payment profile. The compare tool shows how it stacks up against other networks.

How Vungle / Liftoff ranks for this category

All eight mobile networks, same category and audience (10,000 daily users, balanced).

Vungle / Liftoff ranks 5 of 8 here, 81% behind AppLovin MAX.

Practical tips

• Show an app open ad on a cold start only, not every time the user switches back to the app.
• Never place a full-screen ad between the user and the output they asked for.
• Offer a rewarded unlock for occasional premium actions to earn from users who would never pay.

About Vungle / Liftoff

Vungle, now part of Liftoff, is a video-led network whose demand leans towards performance advertisers paying for app installs. Our tables put its Tier 1 Android rewarded estimate at about $12.00 and interstitial at about $8.20, close to AdMob, with fill of around 80%.

All figures come from our benchmark tables: Android eCPMs by tier, category or niche multipliers, modelled fill and the iOS multiplier. They are estimates for planning, not quotes.