At this year’s ChinaJoy, growth remained the gaming industry’s most discussed topic: rising user acquisition costs, diverging international markets, and AI’s accelerating role in marketing workflows.
Beyond broad trends, people wanted practical answers: How do you assess market opportunities? How should content and traffic work together? Once users arrive, how do you turn that momentum into sustainable growth? And who should you work with to achieve it?
Focusing on growth strategies and industry connections, Youdao Ads held two in-person events during ChinaJoy 2026:
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On July 30, the “Game Growth Team-Up: Domestic and International Growth Across Channels” salon explored domestic and overseas markets, content-led user acquisition, publishing, payments, and data.
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On July 31, Growth in Groove took those on-stage conversations into a more relaxed, open industry gathering.
By day, participants worked through growth strategies; by night, they found new teammates. One event explored how to solve the problems, while the other brought together the people who could solve them.
On July 30, Youdao Ads and SocialPeta jointly hosted “Game Growth Team-Up: Domestic and International Growth Across Channels.”
Ten presentations addressed one shared question, covering global marketing data; regional markets including Russia, South Korea, and Vietnam; creator content; AI creatives; media buying; international publishing; payment growth; attribution; and user lifecycle management:
How can a game move from identifying a market opportunity to acquiring users and then sustaining that growth?
Stage One Understand the Market
SocialPeta and Tenjin presented observations on global marketing trends. In the first half of 2026, an average of 109,500 mobile game advertisers ran ads globally each month, up 31.1% year on year. In June, both the share of new advertisers and the share of new creatives reached their highest levels in the observation period. The market continued to expand, but creative testing and turnover were accelerating as well.
Regional ecosystem partners including RuStore, Playio, and Funtap examined user characteristics, channel ecosystems, and localization factors in Russia, South Korea, and Vietnam.
Taking South Korea as an example, the presentation noted that global downloads had fallen 11% compared with 2023, while revenue had risen 7%, improving revenue per download by 20%. This suggests that opportunities in mature markets extend beyond acquiring more users to improving actual engagement, retention, and spending value behind every download.
Choosing markets in 2026 means looking beyond cheaper traffic to better-matched channels, more efficient content iteration, and users with greater long-term value.
Stage Two Find Growth
Once the market is understood, the next step is to validate good content and then amplify it.
In Youdao Ads’ view, what truly differentiates growth is not exceptional strength in just creatives, creators, or media buying, but rapid feedback between all three. Advertising data guides creative production; creators place ideas in a context that feels authentic to players; and proven content then enters the paid acquisition creative library, amplifying its impact further.
Zhong Qi, a Douyin creator with more than 10 million followers, also shared how creator content can win players’ approval. In his view, players come for “the enjoyment games bring,” not to watch ads. Compared with directly listing benefits and selling points, authentic gameplay experiences and a shared language among players are more likely to produce a sense of “that’s me.”
Creators first turn ads into content players want to watch; paid media then amplifies that effective content at scale.
Creatives, creators, and media buying therefore become a growth flywheel in which each continuously informs and reinforces the others, rather than simply handing work from one stage to the next.
Stage Three Sustain Growth
An install is only one outcome. Retention, spending, and long-term user management determine whether growth is truly sustainable.
User acquisition is not the endpoint. Speakers from Playio, UseePay, Miracle Games, and Xiaomi Games discussed post-install behavior, payment conversion, global publishing, and related topics. They explained how to understand user journeys, reduce conversion losses, and turn a single acquisition into lasting user value.
From market assessment and content-led acquisition to data, payments, and publishing, the salon focused on connecting game growth into a coherent process rather than treating each stage in isolation.
Only by moving beyond one-time acquisition toward long-term user management can the growth loop be completed.
Swipe left or right for more event highlights.
On the evening of July 31, the energy of the daytime exhibition moved to a new setting.
Growth in Groove, jointly hosted by Youdao Ads, AppGrowing, Mistplay, and Yeahmobi, opened amid music and lights.
Friends from gaming, AI, brands, media, and the global marketing ecosystem stepped away from packed exhibition visits, meetings, and business schedules.
There was no tight agenda or need to sit across a conference table. Some brought new products; others shared markets and approaches they were testing. For others, a simple “What are you working on lately?” introduced a potential partner for a future project.
Conversations left unfinished during the day continued over music. New acquaintances quickly teamed up, and old friends used ChinaJoy as an opportunity to reconnect. Market information, business needs, channel resources, and ideas for collaboration flowed naturally in the relaxed atmosphere.
If Game Growth Team-Up offered approaches to solving the problems, Growth in Groove brought together the people who could put those approaches into practice.
Swipe left or right for more event highlights.
Two events: one connected the stages of growth, and the other connected industry partners.
In a game market that is changing faster and becoming more complex, creatives, creators, or paid media alone can rarely solve every problem.
Effective growth starts with understanding the market and using content to validate a direction. Creators establish trust, paid media amplifies results, and data, payments, and publishing help turn acquired users into lasting value.
AI is further shortening this process by accelerating content production and localization, supporting decisions about creators and creative ideas, and improving advertising monitoring and data feedback. Its contribution goes beyond making an individual stage faster: it accelerates the cycle connecting markets, content, creators, media buying, and ongoing operations.
ChinaJoy has ended, but new markets, approaches, and partnerships are only just getting started.
See you next time!