I have just created a developer account at Google Play. Now I got to upload the application but I have a few doubts:
Can I add more then one android APKs for different applications?
Is it possible to upload an application for a testing and after that set the price of the app?
Is it possible to set such criteria where first 500 users get a free download and then the app will be paid?
Is it possible to delete an app and re-upload it if something gets wrong while uploading?
Multiple APKs for one application:
Multiple APK support is a feature on Google Play that allows you to
publish different APKs for your application that are each targeted to
different device configurations. Each APK is a complete and
independent version of your application, but they share the same
application listing on Google Play and must share the same package
name and be signed with the same release key.
Besides that, with your developer account you can create multiple application projects and provide your APKs for them of course.
No. After you have released an application for free you can not introduce a price for it. You'd have to create a new app project with a different package name.
This is not naturally supported by the Google Play Store. But you could implement this by writing a counter function that synchronizes over the web. You could also crawl/scrape your app page in the Google Play Store to get the install number. There are various ways.
After you upload your APK, there is some kind of sanity check integrated in the Play Store routine. This should prevent that anything goes wrong during the upload. Anyway, you can also upload a new APK, replacing the previous. That's how app updates work.
Your case overall sounds like you could use In-App-Billing to let your users access most functionality in your app for free, and after a certain time period has passed, offer them the full functionality after a payment.
Keep in mind that it is not a good practice to promote your app for free in the Play Store but then hide everything behind a payment wall inside the app.
Updated answer:
You need to have different package names (i.e. different app projects in your developer account) if you want to offer a free and a paid APK. It's actually a common practice and you'll find many apps in the Play Store that have a "free" and a paid "premium" version.
Very often, it would be easier for you to maintain and to update your app if the premium version only functions as a key (i.e. without actual functionality) that unlocks certain features of the free version. Therefore, you can check in your code if the user has installed the premium version.
Still, it would be more elegant to not "pollute" the Play Store with a dummy premium app and by implementing this with an In-App-Purchase of your premium functionality. Here is a good tutorial (besides the Android guide that I have linked above).
1)Yes, your account can have multiple applications. Or did you mean for the same app multiple apks?
2)No, once an app is free it can't have a price added to it later. If it has a price you can change what it cost though
3)No
4)You can always upload a new version, which seems to be what you want here.
Related
I have multiple apps in my Google Play console and one of the app is very old like 5years, and I didn't updated it since then. It uses Location services in background, so under the "Sensitive permissions and APIs" I have to declare that this app uses background location, but there is also a requirement for "Prominent Disclosure" which must be done within the app itself. As my app was built on old SDK's and libraries, and I've no intention to keep this app active under play store, if I just want to put this "Prominent Disclosure" I would have to update many things to meet current minimum requirements of play store to publish newer version, which is basically time wasting and useless for me. Total user base is also only 3 users.
First I thought to remove this app from my account, but there is no way to do so and we can apparently only "Unpublish" app, which I've already done so.
So is it enough to keep this app "Unpublished" without worrying if Google may suspend my whole account and rest of apps just because of this app? Because other apps in my account has thousands of users.
unpublishing an app won't be against any policies and terms of usage as far as I know so unless any of your other apps are not in compliance with google developer policies nothing will happen to your account
I will be placing google ads in my mobile app but because it's more or less just an app which provides data, I will not be implementing any sort of user registration.
I would like to know what is the correct protocol for submitting a paid and unpaid version of the same app one is just without ads. Is it as simple as create 2 apps in the google app console and export one with ads built in and one without, or is there some form of API that you can use?
If it is just creating 2 app projects in the console, do I have to change the package name? Are there any conflicts that I should look for? I am using React-Native if that is important and for now exporting to only Android.
Edit:
People have recommended I use a single in-app purchase, but my issue is how am I supposed to detect whether a user has paid for the app or not if I'm not tracking users?
I'm in final stage of my project, and I was looking for what to do before publish the app then I came across this App Licensing on https://developer.android.com/google/play/licensing/index.html and this quote
The Google Play Licensing service is primarily intended for paid
applications that wish to verify that the current user did in fact pay
for the application on Google Play.
My app has a free version and a pro version, both have a different package name, the user buy the pro version and after that have anything more to buy (no itens inside to buy).
My doubt is should I implement this Licensing, or it is no needed?
The google play already do this control to not allow that other people can download of .apk and use this pro version without pay for it?
And what I have to do to do the Android on user device delete the .apk and this way avoid that the user give the .apk of pro version to someone else? Has any code that I can implement to do that? Or Google Play take care of it?
Thanks
Is it possible to publish an iOS App in App Store and Google Play Store, which is unlisted and can't be found by search? Only people, who have the link to the App in the Store can download it. Is this possible?
Both Google Play and Apple's App Store have options for publishing Enterprise apps. The two stores have different options and conditions, but it's possible.
Other options that are available to you is to release the app as an Alpha or Beta version for specific people on the Play Store, or simply create an .apk file and allow people to install it without passing through the store.
On the Apple App Store, you also have the option of having your app approved by the review team and then using codes for specific users to redeem on the store (but you only have about 100 of those per version) or submitting the app for TestFlight review (which is a much shorter process), in which case you'll be able to install the app on 1,000 different devices.
I hope one of these options works for you. Good luck!
Yes, this exact thing is now possible in the Apple ecosystem. It's called "unlisted apps". See here. Not sure about Google/Android.
I am wondering what is the best way to have two different versions of an android app. I would like to have version of my app with ads and one without ads (the paid one). What is the easiest way to achieve this ? I have found something called version flavours here but since I am new to android development I am not sure if that is what I want. Please any suggestions for addressing this ?
You could have two versions of the application in Play store. However, you would have to maintain these separately and it is frustrating to upgrade from free to paid with this approach. If you chose this way of maintaining your application, you would have to have two projects, one for each version. This would result you into having two copies of almost identical source code.
One approach I've seen people do is that the free version also contains the premium features which are unlocked once the user installs a paid unlocker application from the store. However, this has the same result as the first option: you would have to maintain two applications (this time different, though) and the users would have to install additional software.
The best option is to include the premium version as an in-app purchase. The app would contain all the premium features but would be locked by default. Once the user pays for the in-app product (in this case the premium membership), he would unlock all the features.
You can read more about in-app billing here.
Why not just publish two apps with the free one as this :
MyApp
and the paid one as this:
MyApp(Paid).
And this is how to prepare them:
Get your app working, and add ads and then sign it and generate the apk. Publish it. MyApp.apk
Then go back, and remeove the ads, change the package name, add the Paid to the name, and then sign the apk. MyApp(Paid).apk
Then Publish it.