'Game Of Thrones' HBO Now App Conquers iTunes, Google Play

The HBO series “Game of Thrones,” based on the fantasy novels by author George R.R. Martin, has broken so many records at this point for silver screen budgets, viewership and fan frenzy that it’s practically in a league of its own. Now the star-studded show is also propelling the HBO Now app to the top of the App Store.

Mashable reported the HBO Now mobile app was the top-grossing app for several days last week. It was still on top at the Google Play store by Monday morning. This app raked in $2.6 million last Wednesday alone, despite an overall slump in quarterly growth, according to data from the app analytics company Sensor Tower.

Plus, HBO Now isn’t the only GOT app popular with the series’s fans. Variety reported the HBO Go mobile app also received a boost in downloads, thanks to GOT, across both Google Play and iTunes. Now there are almost as many mobile apps for GOT fans as there are dead characters in the series.

Beyond addition to mobile games and literary apps, even unrelated apps are garnering traffic with features related to the blockbuster series. Even the language learning app Duolingo now has a High Valyrian course for fans eager to learn the fictional language. Martin himself only created a few phrases for his book. It was the linguist David J. Peterson who developed High Valyrian as a complete language for HBO, the dialect that is supposed to be Daenerys Targaryen’s mother tongue. Quartz reported Peterson worked with Duolingo since 2016 to get the mobile course right. Apps are changing the way fans watch television altogether.

The seventh season has the highest ratings so far, with more than 16.1 viewers tuning in to watch the opener. Some apps now allow users to monitor and compare their viewing experiences with other fans. For example, more than 300 people reportedly used Apple Watch’s Cardiogram app to track their heart rate while watching an episode. So far, the highest average pulse rate came during this season’s fourth episode, “The Spoils Of War,” when Jaime Lannister charged and Daenerys and Drogon.

Last night, all the buzz was focused on Jon Snow and Daenerys, the Mother of Dragons. The queen's stylish winter coat also sparked tons of chatter.

There’s already a mobile game with a few hundred downloads devoted to Daenerys and her dragons fighting against the Night King. It’s called Dragon Thrones: Daenerys War. According to a poll by Rotten Tomatoes and Business Insider, most fans wanted to see Daenerys on the Iron Throne, although Jon Snow was ranked as the favorite hero before the newest season kicked off. Only time will tell how their dynamic will play out. The next season, the last of the series, is scheduled to begin filming in October.