Which app categories depend on paid performance marketing?
Three categories are 100% paid: every tagged Shopping (33), Travel (33), and Finance (31) company runs paid performance marketing [1]. Magazines & Newspapers (88.0%), News (86.7%), and Navigation (63.6%) are close behind [1]. The only category that uses essentially no paid is Health & Fitness at 0.0% [1]. If you're in commerce, travel, or fintech, paid acquisition is table stakes, not a lever you can opt out of.
Shopping, Travel, and Finance apps are each 100% paid-performance-driven — every tagged company runs it, July 2026.
| Item | Paid % |
|---|---|
| Shopping | 100.0% |
| Travel | 100.0% |
| Finance | 100.0% |
| Magazines & Newspapers | 88.0% |
| News | 86.7% |
| Navigation | 63.6% |
| Entertainment | 60.0% |
| Social Networking | 56.7% |
| Food & Drink | 56.5% |
| Music | 45.5% |
| Utilities | 34.8% |
| Health & Fitness | 0.0% |
The finding: transactional categories buy their growth
Paid performance dependence tracks transaction intent [1]. Categories where users arrive to buy, book, or move money — Shopping, Travel, Finance — are universally paid at 100%, because you can bid for high-intent demand and the unit economics support CAC [1]. Media categories (Magazines 88%, News 86.7%) are also heavily paid. The lone holdout is Health & Fitness at 0% paid, which grows entirely on PLG and word of mouth instead.
The breakdown
Paid-performance share within each category (per-row N = category companies with a growth_engine) [1]:
| Category | N | Paid % |
|---|---|---|
| Shopping | 33 | 100.0% |
| Travel | 33 | 100.0% |
| Finance | 31 | 100.0% |
| Magazines & Newspapers | 25 | 88.0% |
| News | 45 | 86.7% |
| Navigation | 22 | 63.6% |
| Entertainment | 25 | 60.0% |
| Social Networking | 30 | 56.7% |
| Food & Drink | 23 | 56.5% |
| Music | 22 | 45.5% |
| Utilities | 23 | 34.8% |
| Health & Fitness | 44 | 0.0% |
How to apply it
In Shopping, Travel, or Finance, budget for paid from day one — 100% of peers run it, so a growth plan without a paid engine is an outlier you'd need to justify [1]. In Health & Fitness, the reverse holds: peers spend nothing on paid and win on product and word of mouth, so pouring money into performance ads fights the category grain [1]. Use the paid base rate to size your CAC assumptions before you model the funnel.
Caveats
Denominator is the 599 growth_engine-tagged companies grouped by category; each row's N is category companies with a growth_engine [1]. growth_engine is multi-select, so 'paid %' is share-citing-paid, not the only channel. A 100% rate reflects this curated sample of established apps; a scrappy newcomer might still test organic-first.
The numbers
| Stat | Computed from |
|---|---|
| 100.0% of 33 | categoryMotionShares: Shopping paid_pct 100.0, n 33 |
| 100.0% of 33 | categoryMotionShares: Travel paid_pct 100.0, n 33 |
| 100.0% of 31 | categoryMotionShares: Finance paid_pct 100.0, n 31 |
| 86.7% of 45 | categoryMotionShares: News paid_pct 86.7, n 45 |
| 0.0% of 44 | categoryMotionShares: Health & Fitness paid_pct 0.0, n 44 |
Sources & citations
- [1] Lazyweb Research analysis of 599 companies, July 2026. categoryMotionShares: paid-performance share within each app category; per-row N = category companies with a growth_engine; denominator = 599. ↩
Source: Lazyweb Research — proprietary analysis of real, in-market app screens. Cite as Lazyweb Research, 2026-07-09.