In 2023, 35 of the 50 largest Russian banks were subject to sanctions. A year earlier, there were only 20 such banks. Due to international restrictions, many banks’ applications were removed from the App Store and Google Play. The Go Mobile company analyzed the operation of mobile banking in 2023 and identified the best among those that are remote and those available in popular stores.
After sanctioned companies faced removal of their apps from AppStore and Google Play, RuStore became the most popular national alternative. 15 of the 22 banks are represented there.
Among foreign application markets, GetApps (Xiaomi) and Samsung Galaxy Store became the leaders in popularity. On both platforms you can download applications from 9 of the 11 sanctioned banks.
All organizations whose apps were removed used web applications (PWAs) and APK files to work with users.
After removing some apps from popular markets, the market situation became less homogeneous, so Go Mobile divided the study into two parts. In total, in 2023, experts analyzed the activities and application performance of 23 banks.
Banks that remain in the App Store and Google Play
These include 11 banking applications. Raiffeisenbank has become a leader in the functionality and capabilities of its mobile application. It also took first place in the “Transfers to other users” category. In addition, Raiffeisen, together with Bars Bank, turned out to be the leader in the “Support Chat” block.
Renaissance Credit Bank became the best in the First Entry category. The bank app has the simplest and fastest initial login and registration process. Raiffeisenbank, Home Bank and Ak Bars Bank became the best in the Home Screen category.
The widest range of features and filters for fast payments are found at Pochta Bank and Credit Europe Bank. “Ak Bars Bank” and “Raiffeisenbank” are leaders in the “Card Actions” block. In the bank’s application you can perform most manipulations with the card: from opening a deposit to choosing the reason for the block.
Thus, the Raiffeisenbank application showed good results in several categories.
A total of 11 banking applications were studied in this category, in addition to those listed: UniCredit Bank, Absolut Bank, Avangard Bank, Expobank and OTP Bank. Although these banks did not face the removal of their applications, in 2023 the number of installations decreased by 5% (by 425 thousand).
Apps that have been removed from the App Store and Google Play
In most blocks, the leading position, independently or on equal terms with others, is occupied by VTB mobile banking. It is the leader in the “First Approach” block and in the “Card Actions” category it shares first place with Tinkoff. In addition, VTB and Tinkoff became leaders in functionality and capabilities.
Sberbank and MKB are leaders in the Payments block, and in the Support Chat category the company highlighted the applications of Sberbank, Otkritie, Tinkoff and Rosbank.
In total, Go Mobile studied 11 banks in this part. In addition to the above, these are Gazprombank, MTS Bank, Bank St. Petersburg, Zenit Bank, Sovcombank.
The company also cites data from Mediascope in its study, according to which banking services are in second place in interest among smartphone users. The messengers came first.
Who uses banking applications?
More than half of app users (53%) are women. A third of all users are people aged 46 to 59, this is the largest category of users.
During the study, Go Mobile analyzed more than 110 indicators for 23 banking applications in the sections “traffic indicators”, “application functionality”, “App UX”, “Digital promotion”, “Adapting to changes” and ASO.
The situation regarding the presence of applications in the App Store and Google Play is presented at the end of August 2023.
Author:
Natalia Gormaleva
Source: RB
I am a professional journalist and content creator with extensive experience writing for news websites. I currently work as an author at Gadget Onus, where I specialize in covering hot news topics. My written pieces have been published on some of the biggest media outlets around the world, including The Guardian and BBC News.
