There’s an app for nearly everything these days, and some of these apps on Google Play Store and Apple’s App Store are doing quite well- which may be the understatement of the year.

If you’re hoping to gain similar success with your app idea, you may want to research apps that fall under your chosen niche. We used Apptopia to gather information on some of Google Play and the Apple App Store’s top grossing apps; real life examples you can use to aid your research. These are just a few examples, but who knows? They may put you on the right path and help recreate their success.

Tinder (Google Play)

Playing Cupid isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but if you plan on launching a dating app, you may want to take a better look at Tinder. One of the world’s best known dating apps, Tinder makes quite a bit of its revenue from running ads. How much does that earn its publishers? Oh, just about a healthy $799K per month on the Google Play Store. And as it turns out, it earns more than twice that on the App Store, which adds another crucial point to your to-do list: finding out which platform suits your app more.

8 Ball Pool^TM (IOS)

Attention all pool players – this is the app you’re looking for. It earns $959K on a monthly basis – 25.7% of which is earned through ads – and is a top earner in its category. If you’re looking for ways to monetize your game with IAPs (In-App Purchases) and ads, you should probably give this app a second look.

Summoners War (Google Play)

Summoners War was published by Com2uS and it generates most of its revenue through in-app purchases. In fact, just 0.7% of its revenue is generated via ads. Making $3.99 million a month on Google Play and $2.42 million on the App Store, this app is a goldmine, and should continue its success.

Spotify Music (IOS)

One of the world’s most popular music services, Spotify has over 75 million users. Spotify operates under a freemium business model which means the users can listen to about 30 million tracks for free – but they can’t download music, improve audio quality or get rid of those pesky advertisements. To do all that, they have to become Paid premium subscribers for the monthly charge of USD 9.99.

Does that work? Well, yeah: Spotify earns $7.71 million every month, which is more than 6 times what its competitor Pandora makes. Sounds like a great deal to us.

Clash of Clans (iOS)

Clash of Clans boasts over 10 million monthly users – and that’s paying off! At an estimated $12.3 million a month it generates more revenue than any other game.

Study apps like Clash of Clans and Boom Beach to understand how they retain players, and what countries they’re popular in. Both are very important factors you’ll need to bear in mind as you plan to launch your app.