The Google Plays Store has a problem, with more Android apps being abandoned in the past six months than updated.
New research from Pixalate paints a grim picture for the Play Store, with a whopping 32% of Android apps abandoned by their developers, while only 30% were updated in Q2 2022. While Apple’s App Store also has a problem with abandoned apps, it doesn’t. almost as big a problem.
In fact, the App Store had 200,000 fewer abandoned apps compared to Q1 2022, while the Play Store had 150,000 more than Q1. What’s more, while the App Store has 500,000 abandoned apps, the Play Store has more than double that number, amounting to 1.1 million.
The same trend applies to “Super-Abandoned” apps, the term Pixalate uses for apps that haven’t received updates in at least five years. The App Store has 141,000 such apps, but the Plays Store has over 166,000.
In addition to potential disappointment for users whose favorite app is abandoned, there are also serious security and privacy concerns. Pixalate found that 23% of abandoned apps have no known privacy policies. Abandoned apps can also pose risks because they use older and outdated libraries and do not have the latest security patches.
The research is a mixed bag for Android, its users and developers. On the one hand, regular Android apps are more likely to be maintained in the long run. On the other hand, users are less likely to give new independent apps a chance for fear that the developer(s) will eventually abandon them.