Google Overtakes Naver in Korean App Users: How the Numbers Were Built
In July 2026 the ranking of Google and Naver by monthly active users (MAU) in South Korea was reversed for the first time. The figure comes from Mobile Index, a data service operated by IGAWorks, and was released on 11 August 2026. The headline is a simple reversal, but understanding how the number is produced changes how it should be read. MAU is not a government statistic. It is an estimate produced by a private analytics firm from a sample, and each firm applies its own panel and its own definitions. The clearest evidence is that ChatGPT's user count for the same month differed by more than seven million between two research firms. This article concerns the method behind the figure rather than the size of the figure itself. Table of Contents What Monthly Active Users Actually Counts The Scope of the Mobile Index Estimate The July Picture in Data Why Research Firms Report Different Figures How AI Search Changed the Entry Point What This Indicator Cannot Tell Us Frequent...