Study: 19% Of U.S. Internet Users Have Paid To Download Games

A new survey finds nearly one in five American Internet users have paid to download digital games, with one in twenty saying they've paid for in-game tools and items. The Pew Internet and American Life Project surveyed 755 adult internet users over three days last Fall and found that 65 percent had purchased and downloaded at least one kind of purely digital product over the internet. The 19 percent of respondents that have paid to download games is ahead of the 16 percent that have purchased online video and the 10 percent that have purchased ebooks, but well behind the 33 percent that have paid for digital music online. In addition to the five percent of respondents that said they purchased in-game items and tools, another five percent said they have paid for "cheats or codes" in video games. Among those who paid for digital content, most spent a total of around $10 per month across all media formats, according to Pew. A few big-spenders drove the overall average digital spend up to $47 monthly, however. Overall, 23 percent of digital purchases among respondents came in the form of paid subscriptions to services like Netflix or OnLive, Pew reported. A smaller 16 percent of those surveyed downloaded individual files while 8 percent paid for access to individual content streams. A December NPD report estimated that digital purchases represented 29 percent of all game sales in the three previous months.