Mobile DevelopmentHow and where to publish your mobile application?

Regardless of whether you are ready to launch your first application or whether it has been a long time since the last time. Publishing an app in the App Store and Google Play may not be as easy as it seems at first sight. And if it’s your first ever application it will be interesting to know that you can publish it not just on the mainstream application stores but there are some different ways to make your app visible to your future users. 

First of all, let’s look at how to publish your app on Google Play and how much it will cost you.

Below we will tell you the full algorithm for adding an application to the Google Play store yourself. If before or after the publication of your application you still have questions or some problems, you can delegate them to us. We create mobile & web applications, analyze the results, and help not only to develop but also to monetize your product. You can view all our services here.

First of all - you need to register your application before publishing it.

So what you will need to register the application:

• Google Play developer account. It costs only $ 25 and this fee, unlike the App Store, is charged only once, upon registration.

• Any computer. Again, unlike iOS, creating and distributing Android apps and games does not require any specific software or platform. You can do this with macOS, Windows, or Linux, in fact, you do it even without Android Studio, the “official” IDE for development.

Android Studio is an integrated development environment (IDE) for working with the Android platform, announced on May 16, 2013, at the Google I/O conference. The IDE has been freely available since version 0.1, published in May 2013, and then moved into beta testing, starting with version 0.8, which was released in June 2014. The first stable version 1.0 was released in December 2014, at the same time support for the Android Development Tools (ADT) plugin for Eclipse stopped. Android Studio is based on IntelliJ IDEA from JetBrains and officially supports Kotlin, Java, and C++ languages. 

Official website: https://developer.android.com/studio

Now let’s finally publish your application.

How to publish an app on Google Play:

• Click the “New Application” button in the upper right corner of the console. 

• Select language and enter a name. 

• In the “Application Description” section, tell users about your application in the “Short Description” and “Full Description" fields. Read our ASO guide if you have any difficulties, or contact us for advice.

• Download graphic assets: screenshots for a smartphone (JPEG or 24-bit PNG format (without alpha channel), no less than 320 pixels, no more than 3840 pixels, the aspect ratio should not exceed 2:1), screenshots for a tablet (note that it is from screenshots for Google Play itself that determines whether your application is suitable for tablet users or not, so if you don't have screenshots, then there is no audience of tablet owners), an icon for the store (note that, unlike the App Store, the icon in the store may be completely different than on the device itself), advertising images (large and small).

• Here you can also specify a link to an advertising video on YouTube.

• Next, you need to define: the type — the game or application you publish, category, and age restrictions (in the form of answers to simple questions).

• After that, enter a link to your website, enter an email address, and (optional) phone number. You will also need a link to the privacy policy, which has become mandatory.

• Please note: now you can make different versions of the page for different languages — up to 5 special versions for different countries.

• Save it and go to the next item — “Prices and distribution". Here you need to choose a paid or free application you publish and set the price and the countries in which it is available. Right there you need to choose support for children's COPPA, support for Wear OS devices, Android TV, and Android Auto, entry into the Designed for Families program, and a number of other, generally speaking, mandatory options.

• Please note: if you indicated when publishing the application that the application is free, then it will not be possible to make it paid. The opposite is quite possible - it is quite possible to make a paid product free.

• In the section “Application versions” next to the “Working version“ section, click ”Configure“ — "Create release".

Here Google Play will ask you if you can give it the key to subscribe to your apps. As a matter of fact, you will still have the key, it's just that Google will be able to manage the creation and distribution of new versions more effectively.

Android apps are signed with a private key. Each such key is associated with an open certificate, with which devices and services can verify the security of applications and their updates. Only those updates whose signature corresponds to the signature of the installed application are installed on the devices. If you allow Google to manage the application signing key, this process will become safer.

After choosing, you will already need a ready-made application file - Android App Bundle (AAP extension) or Android Package (APK extension). You can find the file on your computer or just drag it into this field from Explorer. It remains to set the name of the version and the release note and you are ready to start. Click “Save“ and "View” and “Publish a working version".

If you have no errors in the completed forms, then Google Play will accept the new version and begin distributing it to its centers and it will appear to users for download within a few hours.

Now let’s look at how to publish your app on Apple Store:

• Create a developer ID in the developer section (https://developer.apple.com/register /). This is the encryption key that you use to encrypt all your apps when transferring to the App Store. The cost of the account is $ 99, in fact, that's the answer to the question "how much does it cost to publish an application in the App Store?". For $99 you will get access to the publication of applications.

• In the same section of the official Apple website, create your application ID (App ID on the website or Bundle Identifier in Xcode) in the form com. app booster. bestapp. If you created your project in Xcode, you probably already have this App ID automatically created. If not, create a new one and “enable” all the functions you need.

• The ID of your application has been created, let's go to the publication. There is another website for this (https://appstoreconnect.apple.com /), which is just used to host applications in the App Store. You need the “My Apps" section. There is a “+” button in the upper left corner.

• Choose the platform (iOS), the name (it must more or less coincide with what you have entered in Xcode, otherwise Apple will refuse to publish you), and the language (in fact, the language in the App Store Connect does not affect the application page in any way, the application language must also be specified in Xcode), the package ID (applications, if you did everything correctly in the previous steps, then your application ID should already be in the list, if not, try refreshing the page after a while), SKU (which may duplicate the application ID) and access restrictions.

• If you have done everything correctly, then a new application should appear on your list. It's time for Xcode to send the app to the App Store. surely you have tested the application in the simulator, now you need to create your team profile in the development environment, enter the same Bundle Identifier, select “Generic iOS Device” as the “target”, make an Archive in the top menu and upload the application to the App Store through the download dialog.

• In the App Store itself, you need to fill in all the metadata (name, categories, keywords, description, price, etc.), find the version of your application in the Activity tab, and wait for it to be processed.

• On the application page, add this build and finally, submit everything for review. At the same time, your project will appear in TestFlight and you will be able to test it together with the team.

• After that, it remains only to wait for Apple's reaction and the rights of the application. Now it takes 1-2 days, but in some cases, it may take longer.

Apple has actually made a certain revolution in software distribution and has greatly simplified the distribution of its applications for everyone. Despite the many points, this is a fairly simple and linear process that will allow you to connect to the application economy simply and quickly. If you still have any questions, write to us. We will be happy to help in any aspect of your work with applications.

But now let’s talk about other publication options. 

The first option is to publish your app on Huawei App Gallery. This kind of new applications store becomes more and more popular and publishing your app there is free of charge.

If you want us to create a detailed step-by-step guide on how to publish your application on Huawei App Gallery write it in the comment section below. 

The second option is the easiest one, but there is one big disadvantage. You can easily publish them for free on your website and allow users to download and install the files, but (and it is this option’s big disadvantage) the Android system is strongly recommending users to not install apps from unknown sources, sources different than Google Play marketplace. 

That’s it! Now you know how to publish your application on the most mainstream app stores and also 2 alternative options for how to make your app visible to your users.