Software Bugs Don’t Shelter in Place: What app usage and error data reveal during COVID-19

Few people predicted that 2020 would become the Year of Coronavirus. While the world grapples with lockdown measures and physical distancing guidelines, consumers continue to rely on applications for everyday needs while discovering new apps that can stand in for their previous in-person behaviors.

Contrary to the humans who rely upon them, applications don’t shelter in place. App usage is keeping segments of the economy moving while also providing insights into how people can have their needs met through technology. 

Q1 2020 = largest consumer spend ever in app stores1

>$23.4 billion

spent through the app stores2

>31 billion

new apps downloaded3

20%

increase in Android app usage and time spent in apps YOY4

366%

popularity rise in mobile application development5

Remarkably, error data provides a rather unique lens through which one can examine the COVID-19 economy. Bugsnag conducted data analysis by examining its top 750 projects, segmented by vertical. Through a comparison of user sessions pre-COVID versus session data during COVID, some insightful trends emerge:

1. Some applications are “pandemic-thriving” and have seen a substantial boost (and, in some cases, explosion) in usage during coronavirus.
2. Other applications are “pandemic-proof” and have continued more or less as usual. 
3. Given certain realities and prohibited activities, the final category of apps are “pandemic-rebounders.” Usage has slowed down but will likely rebound when things begin to normalize.

Pandemic-proof applications

Certain types of applications have seen a healthy bump in the number of user sessions during coronavirus, which support their status as “pandemic-proof” applications. Consumers have continued to download and use these apps, but the increase has been moderate. 

Bugsnag’s customer data points to three application types that fall into this category.

eCommerce

SaaS

eLearning

eCommerce

The sentiment around eCommerce is that, overall, apps will see continuous increases as a result of COVID-19. With retail stores closed, consumers are 30.6% more likely to purchase online than they were a year ago.41 Since 24% of consumers express discomfort with in-person shopping at the mall for at least the next six months, it’s primetime for apps and online shopping.42

And the good news is that U.S. retailers are seeing their revenue growth increase year-over-year for online sales, hitting as high as 68% in mid-April.43 What’s emerged is a need for “essentials,” which include items needed at home during lockdown. As a result, approximately 40% of consumer spending has been on items such as office supplies, housewares, beauty and cosmetics, home improvement, fitness equipment, toys, and hobby-related products.44 

How COVID-19 impacts U.S. consumer shopping behavior45

44%

conducted shopping online in mid-May

36%

won’t visit brick-and-mortar stores until a vaccine is available

68%

Plan to buy essential goods online indefinitely

SaaS

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) apps cover a wide range of services. On the whole, the overall SaaS market is facing challenges with companies experiencing, on average, a 40% decrease in sales and accounts being put on hold.46

With that said, the importance of remote work is being highlighted during this time, and some SaaS organizations are seeing growth in usage, especially when free trials and discounts are offered to entice new customers and encourage continued usage.47

B2B SaaS apps that cater to essential services have seen an increase in usage, such as businesses on Yelp who use the service to broadcast delivery or pick-up services and hours of operation.

eLearning

With across-the-board school closures at every level and in-person corporate training halted, eLearning platforms and apps have risen quickly to prominence on a global scale and experienced a significant uptick in adoption and usage.

With 1.2 billion students in 186 countries impacted by COVID-19, schools are using online learning software, video conferencing, virtual tutoring, and eLearning apps to replace in-person classroom time.50 In addition, eLearning apps for adults have seen an increase in learners who want to take courses, with 17% of adults attending a class because of the pandemic.51

Pandemic-rebounder applications

While COVID-19 has uplifted app providers in industries that benefit from consumers sheltering at home, it’s been hard on industries that depend upon movement and travel. As long as consumers are restricted with where they can go and what they can do, these apps are on hold but will likely rebound as the pandemic impact abates.

Bugsnag’s customer data points to three application types that fall into this category.

Consumer Services

Hospitality

Transportation

Safeguard your apps from bugs

For many app providers, COVID-19 has provided an opportunity to keep consumers happy, healthy, and thriving in their homes during shelter-in-place months. Apart from app services that depend on in-person interactions, the pandemic has illustrated what a digital life can look like.

Even more importantly, the overall increase in application usage demonstrates a stark reality for app developers: Application experiences must be safeguarded from crashes and errors. 

Because stability management and error monitoring paint an insightful picture into business performance and demonstrate consumer trends, error data provides compelling metrics and should represent a de facto KPI for applications. 

Here are five reasons how an error monitoring solution helps to keep applications thriving:

1. Reduce Costs and Technical Debt:

Save $1,500 per engineer, on average, each month over debugging.52 Provide a metrics-driven conversation and singular goal around application stability to reduce technical debt.

2. Increase Team Productivity:

Flip from 60% wasted developer time investigating and fixing errors, to a 40% increase in developer productivity when the exact location and source of the error are provided.

3. Drive a culture of code ownership:

Streamline workflows and error triaging in multi-team applications. Filter out the noise originating from another team’s codebase and begin to build team alignment around these bugs.

4. Impact Consumer Satisfaction and Safeguard App Store Ratings:

Since 96% of mobile app users write bad reviews for sub-par apps,53 application stability and error monitoring help organizations avoid poor app store ratings and help keep customers satisfied.

5. Improve Application Health:

Stability scores (think critical stability as an SLA  and target stability as an SLO) calculate real-time error rates and session data to reflect the percentage of successful user interactions per release. 

There’s never been a better time to rely on an error monitoring solution and the insightful data it provides, especially during a global event such as COVID-19. Whether we experience a resurgence of the virus or another global issue that sends everyone home, every application team benefits from monitoring its own stability, knowing which bugs are the right ones to fix, and achieving complete visibility into the app user experience. 

No one knows what the future will hold, but organizations that adopt stability management are better prepared to keep all customers happy and loyal, which is critical when you have their undivided attention.