Who controls AppLovin: share classes and major holders

analysisAppLovin has three classes of common stock: Class A with one vote, Class B with 20 votes and Class C, none of which is outstanding, without votes except where the law requires. The 2026 proxy statement counts 306,086,916 Class A and 30,207,521 Class B shares on March 31, 2026. At the end of 2025 there were about 32 holders of record of Class A and 8 of Class B, and all Class B shares were held by Adam Foroughi and Herald Chen with certain affiliated trusts. ^{1 2}

analysisAt the April 2021 IPO the Class B shares were held by Foroughi, Chen and KKR Denali Holdings L.P., together 93.4% of the votes; their Voting Agreement had all Class B shares voted as two of the three decided, one of whom had to be Foroughi. Today Foroughi and Chen alone are parties: the proxy attributes 66.9% of the votes to the shares under the agreement, enough to decide director elections, charter amendments and major transactions. AppLovin is a "controlled company" under Nasdaq rules but says it does not rely on the related exemptions. ^{3 1}

analysisOn March 31, 2026 Foroughi owned 2,420,296 Class A and 27,936,907 Class B shares, 92.5% of the class and 61.6% of all votes; Chen owned 446,209 Class A and 697,668 Class B shares, 1.6% of the votes, down from 2,397,668 Class B shares in the 2025 proxy. Form 4 filings show Chen converting 143,791 Class B shares and giving away 100,000 Class A shares in August 2026, and Foroughi holding 2,324,954 Class A shares directly that month. In his Schedule 13G amendment for September 30, 2024 Foroughi reported 3,885,217 Class A and 27,936,907 Class B shares, and a group with Chen and KKR Denali of 12.8% of Class A on an as-converted basis. ^{1 2 3 4 5}

analysisJohn Krystynak and Andrew Karam co-founded AppLovin with Foroughi. Before the IPO they held 13.0% and 11.8% of the Class A shares and were registered with the SEC as 10% owners, not as directors or officers; by March 2023 their stakes were 7.0% and 6.7%, and Karam reported 4.4% at September 30, 2024. ^{6 7 8 9 10 11}

analysisThe IPO prospectus also listed Nimble Ventures (6.2%) and director Eduardo Vivas (5.9%) above 5% of Class A. In March 2022 KKR Denali held 44.8% of the votes, Foroughi 29.9% and Chen 4.8%; Hontai App Fund (8.8%), Krystynak (7.8%), Karam (7.1%) and The Vanguard Group (5.2%) held more than 5% of Class A. A year later KKR Denali had 48.7% of the votes and Foroughi 32.4%, with Hontai App Fund (8.7%), Krystynak (7.0%), Karam (6.7%) and Vanguard (5.3%) above 5% of Class A. ^{1 2 3}

analysisAngel Pride Holdings, which held 14.0% before the IPO and reported 7.7% at the end of 2023 in its own filing, is absent from the 2022 and 2023 proxy tables and reappears in 2025 and 2026 at 5.6%. In March 2025 Foroughi had 60.9% of the votes and Chen 5.1%; BlackRock and Vanguard each held 5.4% of Class A, while Midterm Success and Hao Tang were not listed. The 2026 proxy lists Vanguard (8.2%), BlackRock (7.0%) and Angel Pride (5.6%); later filings show Vanguard reporting no shares as of March 13, 2026 and Vanguard Capital Management (6.29%) and FMR LLC (5.1%) reporting new positions as of March 31, 2026. ^{2 3 4 5 6 1 7}

analysisAmong other insiders, Eduardo Vivas held 6,963,289 Class A shares (2.3%) and Vasily Shikin 3,805,555 (1.2%, including options) on March 31, 2026; shares counted for Margaret Georgiadis and Maynard Webb are held by Blue Sage Partners, LLC and Webb Investment Network LLC, with voting power shared with a spouse. In May 2025 Vivas entered into a prepaid variable forward contract, received $131,099,760 and pledged 550,000 Class A shares for settlement in May 2027. ^{1 2 3}