OpenAI’s became the No. 1 app on the U.S. App Store.
That puts it ahead of Google Gemini and OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
[Update: In November 2025, Appfigures revised its estimates of Sora’s day-one installs to be even higher, at 110,000. The original post continues below.]
The firm estimates Sora’s iOS app pulled in a total of 164,000 installs during its first two days, September 30 and October 1.
The day-one figure also puts Sora’s debut ahead of the performance of other major AI app launches, including Anthropic’s Claude and Microsoft’s Copilot, and puts it on par with xAI’s Grok launch. Meanwhile, OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini iOS apps had somewhat stronger launches, with each reaching at least 80,000 downloads on day one.
Since Sora is still invite-only, this may not be the fairest comparison, we’ll admit. It’s possible the new video app could have attracted even more installs if it were open to all users.
Despite this restriction, it’s a fairly strong showing for the new release, indicating demand for AI video tools in consumers’ hands in more of a social networking-like experience. (This is much to the deepfakes of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman asking, “Are my piggies enjoying their slop?”)
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To compare Sora’s early success to other AI apps, Appfigures had to run an analysis that only looked at the other AI apps’ U.S. and Canadian downloads. That’s because the different AI apps on the market have pursued different launch strategies. For instance, ChatGPT initially launched on iOS and its Claude app to iOS last year.
For more of an apples-to-apples comparison, Appfigures crunched the numbers to focus only on each app’s U.S. downloads, plus those in Canada, if the app had been available there at launch.
It found that ChatGPT and Gemini had larger launches than Sora, with 81,000 and 80,000 day-one iOS downloads, respectively. Sora tied with Grok for day-one installs, at 56,000. And it easily beat out the launches from AI apps Claude and Copilot. The former pulled in 21,000 day-one downloads, while the latter only saw 7,000.
Sora also hit the U.S. App Store’s top charts, becoming the No. 3 overall top app by day two. For comparison, ChatGPT reached No. 1 on its second day, while Grok was No. 4, Gemini was No. 6, Copilot was No. 19, and Claude was No. 78.
This post was originally published on October 2, 2025, 11:24 AM PT. It was updated to reflect the app’s higher ranking on Friday.
