Google Play Store Experience Continued

This is a continuation of my last post—sharing my experience with the Google Play Store. As I mentioned before, the Google Play Store has several requirements before an app can be published. Below is a quick recap of those requirements:

1.      Set up Google Play Developer Account

2.      App Signing

3.      App Play Store Presence Readiness

4.      App testing

In my last blog, I shared details about requirements #1 and #2 above. Here, I will provide additional details and my experience for requirements #3 and #4.

Google Play Store Presence

All Android apps have an “app presence” page in the Google Play Store, listing many details about the app such as:

·         Screenshots for phone, tablet and Chromebook

·         Details (i.e. About section of the app)

·         Support (i.e. developer details, contact email, etc.)

·         Categorization (i.e. Game, Health Related, etc.)

·         Content Rating (Everyone, 10+, Teen, Mature, etc.)

·         User Rating

As an app developer, Google requires you to fill out detailed information about the app to generate the above details for the app’s Play Store presence. You must also fill out a series of questionnaires about the app for the Play Store to generate and finalize the app’s categorization and its content rating,

Testing Phase

Before an app can be published to Google’s Play store, Google requires the app to go through a few different testing phases. Below are a couple of testing phases I have gone through for the Xema app so far:

Internal Testing

Google recommends testing your app with a small group of testers, to help identify any issues with the app. This testing phase is not mandatory and does not have any explicit requirements from Google. However, using this testing phase with a small group allowed me to identify and fix many interesting issues with the Xema app (e.g. UX variations, text display issues on various Android devices, etc.).

Closed Testing

This is a mandatory step by Google. It requires your app to be tested by a minimum of 20 and up to 100 developers for a continuous period of 14 days. To be honest, this has been the longest and somewhat painful process in the entire Google Play store experience. Here is a quick summary of all the reasons for the delay during this testing phase:

1.      Enrollment in this testing phase is mandatory. Before enrollment, Google requires the app and all its content to be reviewed and approved by Google. After completing #3 and uploading the signed app, it took Google more than a week to provide initial feedback. My app was initially rejected (for the right reasons), for requiring a user’s location permissions in the background. After fixing that and resubmitting, my app was finally approved.

2.      As per the closed testing requirement, it took me another couple of weeks to find 20 Android users and get them to install and test the app. This was harder than I thought, as most of my friends and family here in the U.S. are iOS users. Fortunately, I was able to reach out to my extended family and friends in India who came to my rescue.

3.      After #2 was done, the two-week continuous testing period had to be completed.