A few specific phrases are moving in the opposite direction to most of what we’ve covered in recent signals:
- “Custom mobile app development services” — down around 20% year-on-year
- “Custom mobile app development company” — down around 80%
- “Mobile app development services custom web design services” — down around 100%
Taken alone, this could look like declining demand for custom app development. But it sits oddly next to other trends we’ve tracked recently: “custom software development” and “bespoke software development London” are both growing, “AI app development” is up around 90%, and “AI software development” is up sharply too.
The more likely explanation is a change in language, not appetite. Buyers seem to be moving away from the phrase “custom mobile app” — which can sound generic, or like it’s describing a commodity service — toward more specific framing: “custom software development”, “AI app development”, or platform-specific terms like “iOS app development UK”.
For SEO and positioning, this is a useful prompt: if “custom mobile app development” was a term we leaned on, it may be worth shifting emphasis toward “custom software development” and “AI app development” instead — see our custom software development and AI-assisted development pages.