Second Life for Android Mobile App Now Has 25,000+ Users - Up 20K in Less Than a Year!

If you don't think there's a market for Second Life on mobile, check out this stat: Last October, the Lumiya app for Android phones and tablets had sold 5,000 copies. But as of last week, it has over 25,000 users.

"25,600 active installations as of today (25168 to be exact)," Lumiya creator Alina Lyvette told me on the 12th. That's out of 27,178 total installations, i.e. a 92% retention rate. "Surprisingly high, I know," she adds, "but probably due to the fact that there's not much SL apps to choose from, and as long as it 'more or less works', user will keep it."

Ms. Lyvette is being modest: as anyone working in mobile (hello, me) can tell you, 92% is an amazing usage rate, as is the growth: The app sells for $2.95 on Google Play, and it's rare for paid download apps to acquire that many customers. Alina attributes that growth in part to the client size of Lumiya: "I've also tried to keep the app size reasonable - Lumiya is only 5 megabytes in size, so it doesn't eat too much precious internal memory on the low-end devices."

What kind of Android owners use Lumiya? Alina Lyvette shared some broad statistics with me there:

"Device-wise the stats are inconclusive because, say, for Samsung Galaxy S3 there are actually about four or five different sub-models targeted at different markets and the like, and Google counts them as different devices... so the stats are mostly noise. More interesting is the fact that about 20% of the active installations are on pre-ICS (Android version prior to 4.0) devices -- that is, low-end smartphones. This is below the market's average (which is 28%) but nevertheless it means that significant proportion of Lumiya users are happy enough to use it for text-only functions." Most of the users (60%) are from the United States, she tells me: "This differs significantly from the market's average (28%) but most likely reflects the popularity of Second Life itself -- although I'm guessing here." (I think she's largely right, and I'd say it also likely reflects the fact that Americans are somewhat more likely to purchase apps than most other regions.)

So again, we're seeing strong interest in Second Life for mobile, at least among Android users. But I bet interest from iOS owners like me would be just as strong: Back in 2010, when the iOS market was significantly smaller, Pocket Metaverse, a text-only app for iOS, sold over 10,000 copies.

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Comments

[Metacam Oh]

ooooohhh, they are charging for it? Countdown until Linden Lab puts an end to that.

[Damien Fate]

That is pretty awesome, congratulations to their team!

[Lani Global]

So in other words, "Second Life for Android Mobile App" has is an "insignificant number of users"?

Needled with a bit of humorous irony :)

Seriously, though, good to see more mobile viewer apps out there. Especially ones that can be used with OpenSim!

[Scumshine]

Wish someone could make a decent app for the iPhone. The one I have just shows my location on a map, inventory, messages, and a chat function.

[Hitomi Tiponi]

@Metacam - why can't they charge for it? It doesn't use the Linden viewer code, which is why it is even more impressive and easily worth the small fee charged for it. Rarely do I find an app that exceeds my expectations but this one does.

[Samadhi Quandry]

I love the Lumiya app. It is is worth the price. I run it on Android 2.3 and have pretty good success. I use it mostly for text stuff. It works better than any of the pc based text only viewers. It has a lot of features.

[Metacam Oh]

Hitomi, where is it in the SL terms of service that you can sell a Third Party Second Life viewer?

[Ezra]

I wish it was available on Kindle's app store as well, I would've long since bought it.

[Alina Lyvette]

Metacam, let me assure you that I have discussed the matter of making a non-free third party viewer with Linden Lab in depth, and was given a green light. As correctly pointed out by Hitomi, Lumiya does not use any part of the original LL viewer code base; it is written entirely from scratch by me, and me alone. And, while I would love to make it free for everyone, I have bills to pay - and, without making Lumiya at least partially pay for itself, I would be unable to put that much effort into it - and, essentially, there would be no Lumiya.

Thanks for your understanding,
Alina

[Metacam Oh]

Hi Alina, I'm in no way saying you shouldn't be able to make money off of it, not at all. I just was under the impression that the Lab did not allow it, that is all.

Take care.

[Shadie]

Y'all payed more than that for a pair of virtual shoes, I use this app and it's well worth it.

[العاب]

Y'all payed more than that for a pair of virtual shoes, I use this app and it's well worth it.