Vietnamese spend $1.7M on Claude, $7.1M on ChatGPT

According to market intelligence firm Sensor Tower, Claude garnered roughly 790,000 downloads across the App Store and Google Play in Vietnam over the first six months, drawing 470,000 monthly active users to rank ninth among the country's most installed and active AI tools.

In terms of revenue, Claude surged to the number two spot—a sharp climb from the first half of 2025, when the application sat at ninth place nationwide.

Speaking with VnExpress, Donny Kristianto, a senior director at Sensor Tower, noted that Claude’s domestic user base consists largely of advanced users and professionals who proactively subscribe to premium tiers like Claude Pro. This willingness to pay often kicks in after users "hit usage limits or explore advanced capabilities."

"As a result, its revenue per user is significantly higher than the industry average," Kristianto said.

A similar pattern is unfolding with Perplexity. While the AI search engine ranked 14th in downloads across Vietnam at nearly 230,000 installations, it took 10th place in mobile revenue, generating more than $184,000.

Further up the charts, ChatGPT continues to outstrip the competition. Vietnamese users poured US$7.15 million into the OpenAI flagship over the six-month period—matching the combined spending across all other AI apps in the market. ChatGPT also dominated adoption with 11.26 million downloads and 20.39 million monthly active users.

Google's Gemini came in fifth in revenue at $440,000, despite racking up 5.64 million downloads and 9.21 million monthly active users.

While Sensor Tower tracks only in-app transactions completed directly via the App Store and Google Play—omitting web checkouts and enterprise sales—the figures highlight how select apps generate revenue far out of proportion to their download volume. The findings also underscore that professionals and researchers in Vietnam are increasingly ready to pay for AI when it delivers tangible productivity gains.

An artificial intelligence specialist pointed out that revenue per user for tools like ChatGPT and Gemini hinges on several factors, including generous free tiers that let users test features without paying immediately. Furthermore, web-based purchases and third-party billing bypass mobile app stores entirely—such as Google users unlocking premium Gemini tiers through Google Drive storage plans, or university students signing up through discounted educational rates

Logos of AI applications Grok, ChatGPT, and Claude displayed on a smartphone screen, March 2025. Photo by Luu Quy

According to a Sensor Tower report, AI companies in Vietnam are focusing less on just attracting new users and more on actually making money. Consumer spending on AI applications surged by 155% and 242% year-over-year starting from 2023. In the second quarter of 2026 alone, Vietnamese spent $8.54 million on AI apps—nearly double the $4.99 million spent during the entirety of 2024.

Even so, spending per install in Vietnam still lags well behind international benchmarks. In the second quarter of 2026, global revenue per download reached $2.115, roughly five times higher than Vietnam's figure. According to Sensor Tower analysts, this disparity signals substantial headroom for domestic growth as artificial intelligence becomes further embedded in workplaces, creative workflows, and professional research.

On the global stage, Claude also claimed second place in generative AI mobile revenue for the first half of the year, hauling in $358.34 million compared to ChatGPT’s dominant $2.7 billion.