Roblox is reported to let creators ship games as separate apps on mobile, PC and consoles

Roblox will soon let creators publish games built on its platform as separate apps on mobile phones, PCs, and consoles, with Roblox remaining the engine underneath, according to a TechCrunch report published Friday ahead of the company’s 1 p.m. Eastern Developers Conference keynote in San Jose. Roblox had not posted a matching newsroom or investor-relations release as of 12:45 p.m. Eastern.

Nothing in that report specifies whether exported titles would still run on Robux, still pay creators on the current split, or who would be the developer of record on Apple, Google, or a console store. The timing is a quarter Roblox has already guided to a 14% to 18% drop in bookings, with full-year guidance withdrawn.

Separate apps, browser links, and Build

The report, citing the company, gave no launch date for exported apps, no list of app stores or console partners, and no description of who would submit the title, host the servers, or own the player account. Browser play was dated more tightly as a join-via-URL claim by year-end, without saying which browsers, which games, or whether a Roblox login still sits in the middle.

Build, the prompt-based creation tool Roblox put into public alpha in New Zealand on July 28, is expanding to Serbia and Singapore with desktop access, alongside a longer list of creator tools. Roblox, per that report, said game makers have earned more than $5 billion since 2013, including $1.7 billion in the last 12 months. None of the package came with a revenue, bookings, or daily-active-user estimate.

Robux, Apple’s cut, and the graph an export leaves

Roblox still makes its money the old way. Users buy Robux, spend them on items and access inside experiences, and creators take a share. The company’s creator documentation says creators generally earn 70% of Robux sales inside their own games and 30% of Marketplace sales. Eligible creators cash out Earned Robux through Developer Exchange at $0.0038 per Robux, or $114 per 30,000.

A large slice of that spending already crosses Apple and Google. In the first quarter, 26% of Roblox revenue came from Robux sales through the Apple App Store and 15% through Google Play, and the company says it is obligated to pay up to 30% of user payments on those stores and on consoles. Apple’s own small-business rate is 15% below a revenue threshold and 30% above it; Google charges 15% on the first $1 million of annual Play billing and 30% after that. Whether either schedule would apply to a Roblox-exported title depends on who is the developer of record.

Those 26% and 15% figures are shares of revenue, not of bookings. Roblox does not break bookings, the cash users spend, out by Apple, Google, prepaid cards, or the Roblox website, so how much of today’s cash take sits behind a 30% store fee cannot be sized from the filings. Until that channel mix, and the payment path on an exported title, are specified, the export feature is a distribution promise, not a change to the model.

An exported title that leaves the Roblox app also leaves the 123 million-person social graph, the single currency, and the built-in payout rail that Unity Software and Epic Games do not ship with their engines. That is what a Roblox-built game gives up the moment it becomes a separate icon. Whether the point is to let Roblox-native creators put a game on a home screen, or to court Unity- and Unreal-class studios, those are different businesses, and the economics of either one still run through whoever collects the payment.

Bookings are still the constraint

The last official numbers are from July 30. Second-quarter revenue was $1.47 billion, up 36%. Daily active users were 123 million, up 10%, hours engaged were 29 billion, up 5%, and average monthly unique payers were 27 million, up 15%. Bookings, the cash users spend, rose 8%, at the low end of guidance. Management described that as a shortfall driven by lower per-hour monetization among younger U.S. and Canada cohorts and by discovery changes that favored retention over near-term spending. Most bookings are recognized as revenue over an estimated 27-month paying-user life, which is why revenue can still rise in a quarter when cash spent on the platform slows.

For the third quarter, Roblox guided revenue up 4% to 10% and bookings down 14% to 18%. It dropped full-year guidance and said it would give only quarterly outlooks. Management said on July 30 that its conviction in 20%+ compounded long-term top-line growth had not changed, that second-quarter monetization softness would persist, and that it would spend more on infrastructure for AI projects including Build.

Roblox shares were $45.94, up 2.4%, as of 12:45 p.m. Eastern, a live session print before the keynote. Oppenheimer on Friday reiterated an Outperform rating and a $50 price target ahead of the conference. The firm had cut that target from $82 on August 4 after updating 2026 revenue and EBITDA estimates. The stock is 29% higher over the past month and still 43% lower this year. That path was in motion before anyone had a confirming release from Roblox.

The funds that already hold it

Roblox is a 5.1% to 7.4% position in the dedicated U.S. video-game and metaverse funds. Those wrappers were up about 2% Friday as the shares rose; they are not a pure Roblox bet.

Holdings as of Friday, except BHERO as of Thursday. The same books already hold Unity, the engine company Roblox would more directly overlap if exported apps become real.

Specifying who collects the payment would not, by itself, change the cash users spend on Roblox. The 1 p.m. Eastern livestream is where that specification can arrive.