How App Developers Find New Growth with Mobile OEM Advertising Across 86% of Android Devices

Most UA conversations this year have been circling the same drain. Meta CPI is up. Google UAC is fine but flatlining. iOS signal is what it is post-ATT. Spend the same money in the same places, get a slightly worse return. Repeat next quarter.

This piece is for anyone running Android user acquisition. Optimization has done what it can. The bigger problem is that everyone's optimizing against the same Android audience pool, on the same platforms, with the same algorithmic constraints. There's a ceiling, and most teams running app UA at scale have hit it. It's not an argument that Meta and Google are over (they're not). It's an argument that any growth team relying solely on the duopoly for Android UA is leaving a third channel untouched. 

That channel is mobile OEM advertising. Mobile OEM advertising reaches roughly 1.85 billion daily active users across 86% of global Android shipments. It runs on inventory the duopoly doesn't own (alternative app stores, on-device ad surfaces, and Dynamic Preloads on new devices) and integrates directly with Airbridge for measurement. Here's where it fits in a modern performance mix.

What's clear is that mobile OEMs aren't just a niche. Mobile OEMs are now part and parcel of the mainstream.

A quick primer on mobile OEM advertising

Mobile OEM advertising is an Android-only channel. Apple's tightly controlled iOS ecosystem doesn't have an equivalent, which means OEM is one of the few places Android UA gets dedicated, scaled inventory that Meta and Google don't already monetise.

OEM stands for Original Equipment Manufacturer: Samsung, Xiaomi, HONOR, OPPO, vivo, Transsion (which owns Tecno, Infinix and itel), Huawei, and others. They sell the devices, but they also run their own software stacks on top of the hardware. That includes alternative app stores like Galaxy Store and GetApps, pre-installed native apps like App Vault, Mi Browser and Themes, and a lot of advertising surface area on the device itself.

Across the OEMs AVOW works with as official core agency for Xiaomi, vivo and OPPO, and as an early partner for Samsung and HONOR, the combined footprint covers around 86% of global Android shipments and 65% of all mobile devices in use, working out to the 1.85 billion daily active users referenced above.

Inventory comes in four shapes: placements inside the alternative app stores, on-device display ads (lock screen, app drawer, notification feed), Dynamic Preloads via Google Play Auto Install on first device boot, and branding placements like splash screens. The buying side will look familiar to anyone running performance: CPI, oCPC, ROAS. None of this competes with Meta or Google for the same impression.

Learn more about OEM Advertising here. 

Three places mobile OEM advertising earns its spot in the mix

It would be wrong to frame mobile OEM advertising as a Meta or Google replacement. The right framing is complementary. Three specific gaps where OEM ads tend to do real work:

1. Android reach beyond Meta and Google. 

This is the use case that gets most large advertisers in the door. If you've been running Meta and Google in your core Android markets long enough, the addressable pool is already saturated. New spend buys overlapping users at higher prices.

OEM inventory sits outside that pool. A user browsing the Galaxy Store, looking through App Vault or unboxing a new device is somewhere social spend can't reach. Tripledot Studios is one example. The London-based gaming studio partnered with AVOW to run display advertising and Dynamic Preloads via Google PAI across Samsung, Xiaomi, OPPO and vivo, scaling first in EMEA before testing additional growth in LATAM and SEA. The campaigns came in 20% above their performance targets in EMEA and delivered 15% higher results than Tripledot's other preload channels, reaching audiences their existing Meta and Google spend couldn't.

2. Fraud-clean, performance-priced inventory. 

Two things make OEM unusually clean from a buying perspective. The impression and install both happen on hardware the manufacturer controls, which means there's no third-party network in the middle. MMPs like Airbridge add another layer of verification by checking traffic quality with device-level signals and fraud validation rules, helping advertisers identify suspicious installs, touchpoints, and conversion patterns.

Explore more about Airbridge’s Fraud Validation Rules here. 

The second is pricing. Most placements are CPI. On-device display can run on oCPC with a daily budget, where the OEM bids in real time on the user's likelihood to convert. Dynamic Preloads via PAI need no SDK integration, and from paperwork to live campaign is usually around two weeks. Channel test cost is genuinely low.

3. Geographic expansion outside the duopoly's home turf. 

This is where OEM stops being tactical and gets strategic. Through aggregated OEM partnerships, mobile OEM advertising reaches a substantial share of the Android base in every major region outside North America:

• Africa: 91%

• Southeast Asia: 87%

• India: 84%

• CIS: 75%

• MENA: 70%

• Europe: 57%

• LATAM: 55%

These reach figures cover AVOW's combined OEM partnerships in each region. You can check OEM reach for your specific markets using the AVOW reach calculator for more granular planning.

For app companies expanding into any of these regions, OEM is often a more efficient first-wave channel than pumping more budget into Meta or Google in the same geos. Kredivo, an Indonesian buy-now-pay-later fintech, partnered with AVOW to run user acquisition across Xiaomi, OPPO and vivo with a customized commercial setup for each OEM. The campaigns delivered a 46% install-to-loan-application rate, 2.2x YoY install volume growth, 4.7x YoY growth in ad spend, and a 24% share of new product exploration via Dynamic Preloads within six months. OEM is now Kredivo's top performance channel outside the SRNs.

Where Airbridge fits

The single most common objection on mobile OEM advertising is measurement. UA leads have built their dashboards around their MMP, and a channel that doesn't show up at the same fidelity is a channel they don't trust.

OEM ad inventory plugs straight into Airbridge, flowing installs and post-install events through the same attribution stack you’re already running. In practice, that means:

• Unified cross-channel reporting. CPI, ROAS, retention curves, and event funnels for OEM appear next to Meta, Google, and other paid channels in a single view. No separate dashboards to reconcile, no manual exports to run before your weekly review.

• Device-level fraud verification. Because both the impression and the install happen on hardware the manufacturer controls, Airbridge verifies OEM inventory at the device level. Reported install fraud is negligible compared to open programmatic, which makes OEM one of the cleaner buys in performance advertising.

• Incrementality measurement without running experiments. Airbridge’s observational incrementality lets you measure the real lift OEM delivers on top of your existing channel mix, without holding back spend or designing holdout tests. You see the true additive effect, not just attributed volume.

• 330+ ad network integrations already in place. OEM surfaces connect through the same integration layer as every other network in your stack. There’s no new SDK implementation required, no new data pipeline to build before you can start measuring.

A couple of things to configure properly from the start:

• Standardise event definitions across channels. Cost-per-deposit or cost-per-registration comparisons only hold up if you’re tracking the same event with the same definition everywhere. Set this up before you start comparing OEM performance against social – mismatched event definitions are the most common reason OEM looks artificially cheap or expensive in cross-channel reviews.

• Don’t rely solely on last-touch attribution. OEM tends to sit earlier in the user journey than social does – particularly for Dynamic Preloads and app store placements on new devices. Last-touch models will systematically undercount OEM’s contribution. Multi-touch or incrementality-based measurement will give you a more accurate read of what the channel is actually delivering.

What's harder about mobile OEM advertising

Mobile OEM advertising isn't a clean, single-vendor channel like Meta. The biggest practical challenge is fragmentation. Each OEM has its own ad formats, bidding logic and inventory mix. Galaxy Store featuring isn't the same product as Xiaomi App Vault, which isn't the same as vivo Apps-Selected. Running OEM properly at scale means working across thirteen-plus distinct surfaces. Most teams don't build that capability in-house, which is why aggregation partners exist.

The second challenge is that OEM strength varies sharply by region. Samsung leads in Europe and LATAM. Xiaomi leads in CIS. OPPO and vivo lead South and Southeast Asia. Transsion leads in Africa. An OEM strategy can't be a single global plan, it has to break down market by market.

The growth that's hiding in plain sight

The performance ceiling most app marketers are running into isn't really a budget issue. It's a mix issue. After two years of optimising harder against the same Meta and Google inventory, the room left to find new efficiency on those platforms gets smaller every quarter.

The teams that break through aren't the ones running cleverer social campaigns. They're the ones who've added a third channel to their stack, on inventory their competitors haven't tested. Mobile OEM advertising is that channel. The audience is at scale, the buying models are familiar, Airbridge integration makes it measurable from the first install, and the activation lift is light enough that there's not much reason to put off testing it.

By default, mobile OEMs need to be part of every marketer's mix.

For a deeper walkthrough of each OEM placement type, geographic priorities and how to structure a first test, AVOW's definitive guide to mobile OEM advertising covers the channel end to end.

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About AVOW: AVOW is a global app growth company specialising in mobile OEM advertising. Recognised as Xiaomi's Core Agency of the Year three years running (2022, 2023, 2024), winner of vivo's Best Agency Partner award, OPPO's Strategic Agency Award, Huawei's Best Agency of the Year, and HONOR's Global Best Support Partner for 2025. AVOW works with 150+ advertisers across 13 OEM partnerships globally.