Google Play Store (formerly Android Market) is an online digital marketplace offering apps, games, music, movies, television shows and books for Android smartphones, tablets, Wear OS watches and Chrome OS devices like smart TVs.
Apps and games can be updated over any network – mobile data or Wi-Fi, for instance – with either automatic updates or manual ones being made available to users. You have the choice between automatic updating apps/games or updating them manually at your own leisure.
Apps
The Google Play Store (formerly Android Market) is the central platform for app downloads to smartphones and tablets, originally launched in October 2008. Since its debut, numerous updates to its UI as well as additional functionality and content have been introduced since its initial release.
As with other digital marketplaces, the Play Store offers an assortment of programs tailored to a range of interests and needs. Here you will find games, music, movies, books and much more!
Each app or game has its own dedicated page that offers plenty of details about what it does and why you should download it. You will likely see screenshots, video previews and the minimum operating system requirements; plus you can often read user reviews and determine its age recommendation.
Apart from rating and reviewing products, the Play Store allows you to search for specific apps or games by name, keyword or category. Furthermore, items can be added directly into your wishlist for later consideration or purchase.
Google Play requires developers to abide by stringent security standards, regularly scanning its app catalog for malware or any potential security risks. Google also takes user reviews seriously, filtering out any fake or biased reviews which might sway your decision making. As a result, this makes Google Play an excellent way of finding safe and trusted applications and games for Android devices with handy alert notifications of available app updates.
Games
Google Play serves as the go-to store for apps, games and digital media on Android devices. Users can search content, download it to their devices and assign which accounts and devices will install it. Account and purchase information is stored securely in the cloud across devices.
Google takes a 30% cut of purchases, subscriptions and microtransaction payments made on its platform, according to Sensor Tower estimates that total app store revenue reached $21.5 billion last year with mobile game revenues being the primary component.
Parents often employ parental controls on devices to limit the exposure of their children to violent and disturbing video games, but some gory titles continue to bypass Google’s age rating policies and filters, such as Mad Max Zombies with its spurting blood and walking corpses, Dentist Games – Baby Doctor and Mermaid Mommy – New Ocean Baby, among many others. Other games require specific permissions like location and identity tracking and will continue to attract attention for that reason alone.
The app store offers games across many genres and subgenres, from popular titles to obscure niche releases. Some are free, while others cost money up front or are subscription based. Developers can earn revenue through ads placed in their games as well as charge one-time fees or sell consumable in-game items.
Google Play not only offers digital media storage solutions like games but also hosts books, music and movies – it provides gamers a social space to find friends, share achievements and compete in multiplayer matches.
Movies & TV
Google Play was initially established as a media giant, offering apps, music, books and movies all under its umbrella. At its height, it provided one convenient experience for purchasing and renting Hollywood-quality video content.
Google has over time diverged its content offerings and the Play brand into distinct platforms: Google TV (which aggregates streaming services and other content), YouTube (for movie purchase a la carte) and Google Play Books – the only remaining component being its Shop tab within Android TV.
Google recently informed Android TV owners that its Movies & TV app will be retired on October 5. Going forward, customers should use either YouTube or the Google TV app for buying and renting content, according to an email sent from the company to Android TV owners.
Users will still be able to view purchases made in the YouTube app, though family sharing and watchlist support will no longer be offered. While this change may seem drastic, it is simply part of how things have developed; currently the YouTube app contains many of the same functions previously available via Movies & TV app (including downloading video for offline viewing) plus some additional ones that Google promises will continue being added as it sees fit.
Books
Google Play Store was initially introduced as a hub for apps and games, but has also grown into an extensive book marketplace with new releases, bestsellers, textbooks and self-publishing options similar to Amazon Kindle Store and Apple iBooks Platform. There are dedicated Android and iOS apps as well as an intuitive web interface available for this service.
The Books app is an intuitive e-book reader compatible with most major e-readers, featuring seamless library synchronization across devices and sharing of reading positions, bookmarks, and notes between platforms. Furthermore, this reader allows for highlighting, searching within book text search capabilities, as well as night mode for low light reading experiences.
As an author, Google Play is a powerful way to market your ebooks to a broad audience. But prior to 2020 it often underwhelmed authors due to issues like automatically discounted prices that made competing against distributors such as Amazon and iTunes difficult.
To sell your book through Google Play, a Payment Profile needs to be set up. You can do this by visiting the ‘Payment’ tab of your Google Play Publisher account and checking this area of it. In addition, accept their updated Terms of Service in order to access their ‘Publish Books’ tab – where your books can then be uploaded onto their storefronts.
Music
Google Play Store doesn’t just provide apps and games; it also houses an extensive music collection. Play Music, the company’s answer to Spotify, Tidal, and Apple Music streaming services, provides access to your own music uploaded directly into the cloud (with subscription) that can then be streamed across multiple devices. Plus it features radio stations and playlists for discovering new tunes!
Recently, Google updated their interface for Google Drive to make it more user-friendly and cleaner; although I found some elements of its layout confusing at first.
One of the great things about Google Play Music is that it works seamlessly with all your existing music. Google’s software will scan your computer for music files and start uploading them – including lossless FLAC and MP3. Furthermore, its free Google Play Music Manager program – which functions similarly to iTunes – lets you easily back up local collections onto the cloud.
Google Play Music gives you the option of watching music videos when available, which adds an extra special touch. You can create playlists, add songs to your library and rate tracks up or down; as well as stream entire albums online or download them for offline listening if necessary.
Videos
Google Play has long been the go-to place for apps and media – games, music, movies, books – with games, music videos, movies and books available at any moment in time. You can buy or rent video content such as movies and TV shows on Android phones and tablets or through third-party smart TV apps like Roku; although that last bit seems less significant now that Google is discontinuing the Google Play Movies & TV section in favor of using its YouTube app on TVs and set-top boxes instead.
Google doesn’t require apps to feature videos on their listing pages, but strongly encourages developers to do so. Video has been shown to increase engagement with an app and more likely get people downloading one when presented with engaging and captivating video content.
An app’s listing page should feature a video that helps viewers better understand its purpose and benefits, with localized versions to make finding it in different countries/languages easy.
App video marketing can be challenging and requires specific skills, resources, and expertise. If you want to take your app marketing efforts one step further, contact ShyftUp – an app user acquisition agency with experience helping many developers and marketers meet their app marketing goals. We specialize in creating and optimizing app videos for Google Play listing that attract more users.
