The "3 months listed, 1.68M installs" is an illusion: Permen Comic renamed an old Brazilian package and took it to India

Permen Comic, listed on Google Play as launched in 2026 Jul 15 with 1.68M installs, 26.5k ratings, and showing up on comics Top Grossing charts in a dozen-plus countries, is actually an old package listed at the end of 2023, originally named "Permen Comic for Brasil". Behind it is a Korean manhwa overseas matrix run by a Chinese team through a Singapore company, based in Indonesia, selling adult romance comics translated into Indonesian. This India push was an old package renamed to enter a new market, not a new product taking off. Below: how it works, where the money comes from, what that Top Grossing chart really means, and whether it's worth following.

An Indian user who bought the "lifetime VIP"

2026 Oct 5: an Indian user left a one-star review on Permen Comic's Google Play page: "I bought the lifetime membership, it shows permanent VIP, but I can only read up to chapter 4 of each comic, after that it asks for coins... what is the lifetime membership for? I wanted to contact support and it jumped me to Facebook."

Looking back, on Sep 6 someone wrote "What's the point of permanent VIP, after chapter 5 it's still locked and you need coins to unlock," and on Sep 22 someone wrote "This is a huge scam, I bought lifetime VIP and still have to buy coins to read." Over the same period in Indonesia, under the same brand's other app, people complained almost daily in Indonesian about the same thing: "Bought a one-year VIP, but every chapter still needs coins, and the coins are expensive" (10-23), "VIP abal abal, suruh beli koin terus" (VIP is fake, keeps making you buy coins, 10-31).

Complaints aside, the Indian app broke into the top 10 of the local comics free chart in Oct 24; the Indonesian app now has 2.9M installs and ranks #7 on the Indonesian comics free chart (Google Play, 11-06).

What it actually is

A standard Korean comic reader: the store listing says "Korean and Japanese comics, everything you want to read" and "updated daily." Chapters are unlocked with coins, single in-app purchases run $0.99 to $34.99, there's a "lifetime VIP" for sale, plus ads and "complete tasks to earn coins." Reviews in the Indian store often say "complete task and get coins"; some are blunter: "I found a good adult app for my desire finally" (10-24).

The developer is listed as HELLOAPPTE, with the main entity HELLOAPP PTE. LTD. in Singapore, incorporated in November 2022. LinkedIn shows only 1 employees, and the contact page on its website is titled in Chinese, "联系我们" (Contact Us). Its earliest app was called com.suiwan.oversea.comic, which matches a Xiamen game company called "Suiwan" (suiwan.com). The likely read is that a Xiamen team is going global through a Singapore shell company (an inference from the package name only, not verified).

The same brand is split into several apps by language, all backed by candycomic.com ("permen" is Indonesian for "candy"):

(Google Play installs, 11-06; listing dates from AppBrain and apkcombo.)

How "3 months, 1.68M" came about

The store lists the launch date as 2026-07-15, but AppBrain records this app as "On Google Play since December 2023"; in January 2025 the v1.7.3 was still called "Permen Comic for Brasil," by which point it had 1M+ installs and 24k ratings (MEmu, AppRecs).

In other words, the team took an older app that had built up installs and ratings in Brazil, renamed it to the country-free "Permen Comic," swapped in an English listing, and moved it to English-speaking markets like India, Southeast Asia and the Middle East. The installs, ratings and account standing were all inherited, and the store launch date got reset as a side effect. Of the 1.68M, only about 200k were new in this round (third-party tracking rose from 1.47M to 1.68M, AppGoblin).

The bar for India's comics free chart is low. Per AppInsider's timeline: in Oct 10 it first entered the top 100 of India's comics free chart, and in Oct 24 it reached the top 10; in Oct 22 the in-app purchase cap was raised from $18.99 to $34.99. After charting there was a wave of store-browse traffic. That wave has passed: in Oct 29 it was #8 on India's chart, and by Nov 6 it had fallen to #24; over the last 7 days it added only 2,718 installs in total, with some days at 0 (Google Play, 10-29 to 11-06).

Top-grossing charts across a dozen countries are really the same chart

The most eye-catching data point: in Nov 6, it appeared at the same time on the comics top-grossing charts in India, the UAE, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Poland, Argentina, South Africa, Vietnam, the Philippines, the Netherlands, Mexico and Singapore, ranking #53 to #58.

But the comics top-grossing chart in these dozen-plus countries is essentially one list of about 70 apps, with the top five always Naver Webtoon, WEBTOON, RIDI, Tappytoon and Manta. It sits at #53–#58, which is the bottom of that list, next to small apps like Tinyview and 2000 AD. That doesn't prove much about revenue. Third-party estimates put its monthly revenue below $10k, with 72% from ads (AppGoblin, estimate).

The Indian reviews don't look like real readers either: all 150 sampled reviews are from India, 120 are five-star, mostly one- or two-word praise like "good," "nice," "super," "preety," and many reviewer names look Nigerian, Filipino or Pakistani. The rating distribution is odd too: 1-star and 3-star each have 1,561 reviews, 2-star has 0, and the Indonesian app has the same shape. Whether these short reviews were earned by completing tasks can't be determined from the outside (unverified).

The real business is in Indonesia

Looking at the app within the whole brand, it survives on three things:

Demand that legitimate platforms avoid and pirate sites hold. The Indonesian app is tagged 17+, "sexual themes, partial nudity." Indonesian web has many pirate sites for "komik dewasa / manhwa 18+" (Mangasusu, KomikDewasa, Kisahverse...), so the readers are already there. Permen packages this content into an app that can be downloaded from Play and paid for, translated into Indonesian.

Some reputation in niche circles. By 2024 there were Indonesian-language YouTube tutorials on "how to fix the various problems with Permen Comic," and videos making "Permen Comic alternatives" (12k views); there are plenty of MOD cracked-APK sites, and TikTok has posts about "APK MOD PermenComicid VIP" (2026-08,5,900 views). Someone bothering to crack it shows people want to read it without paying. Beyond that, there's no media or X discussion.

A matrix of apps, replaced whenever one is taken down. The first app has already disappeared from Play; an Indonesian review from December 2025 reads "paling nanti hilang lagi" (probably gone again soon). Users have gotten used to following the apps as they change. Splitting apps by language and renaming old ones for new markets is also what MangaToon does (separate Spanish and Portuguese apps), just at an order of magnitude larger scale.

Who it's competing with

(Google Play installs, 11-06.)

In India, local players Pratilipi and Toonsutra, plus the newly arrived Kuku FM, are all there; in Indonesia, several local peers already exist. The product itself has no real differentiation; what differs is the audience and the playbook.

If it were you

The takeaway: there's a useful tactic here: reusing an older app with existing traction to enter a new market is far cheaper than cold-starting a new one. But copying the business itself isn't worth it. In this round it only added 200k installs and an estimated monthly revenue below $10k, and its real foundation (a source of Indonesian adult Korean comics and older users) is something you can't get.

Who it's for: overseas teams that already hold licenses for comics, novels or short dramas; or anyone with an older app that built installs and ratings in one country, now stalled, and wants to relaunch it in another market.

Who it's not for: indie developers without a content source who want to start by aggregating Korean comics. Most of this kind of app's content comes from unclear sources, adult apps still have to pass store review, and takedowns are the norm; this one itself relies on a matrix of apps to dodge them.

How to do it:

• Learn the tactic, don't copy the content. Rename an older app's title and listing to a generic version, move it to countries where the category chart bar is lower (in India, a thousand-plus installs a day can get you into the top ten of comics), and carry over the existing installs and ratings.
• Do the opposite where it gets the most complaints. Users in both countries are angry about the same thing: buying "lifetime VIP" and still having to buy coins. Spelling out clearly what VIP includes and making it actually possible to read everything is a ready-made selling point.
• Go legitimate with the content. Licensing from small and mid-size Korean and Chinese rights holders, with minority-language translations, is what lets you stay in the stores long-term.

How to acquire users: local-language category free charts plus store search are the main channels; in-app "complete tasks to earn coins" drives activity and ratings; in markets like Indonesia, YouTube tutorials, Lemon8 and TikTok reader communities will spread the name for you.

When to get in early: no rush. This isn't a time-window opportunity; its India run was already declining by early November.

What would show we got this wrong: if it climbs back into the top 10 of the free chart or the top 30 of the grossing chart in India or another English-speaking market, it would mean reviving an old app is more effective than it looks, and paid comic demand in India deserves a fresh look.