The Competition Commission of India wants Google to open the Play Store for third-party app stores. With this ruling from the Supreme Court of India, it looks like it’s not only happening in India, but Google will now allow third-party app stores worldwide. With the release of Android 14 Developer Preview, there is a new API supported, which confirms that Android 14 will support third-party app stores even better.
Google is one of the biggest app store providers among its competitors, which is obvious as Google bundles it with Android. The company also earns a hefty amount from the cut they receive from any in-app purchase made. The company also laid down strict restrictions to maintain its app store dominance.
As of now, there is no major competition against the Play Store because of its ability to perform automatic updates. Third-party app stores don’t have this ability, but now the API introduced with Android 12 allows them to use the automatic app update functionality without needing user action.
However, even after that, many app stores didn’t implement this because they didn’t know when to do automatic updates or whether it would be safe. Google acknowledged this and has been working on it since then. Google is finally looking to bring it to Android 14.
Android 14 will now share certain conditions before third-party app stores automatically update an app. This means auto-updates will be performed without disrupting the user experience. This will be known as a gentle update. It will share information like if the app is being actively used or in use if the screen is on if it has an active foreground service, or if it is making phone calls.
That’s not all. Now, third-party stores can be set as the only source for future automatic updates to an app. This means other app stores won’t be able to create conflicts with the update. However, the feature is still unknown, and it will only come into effect with the stable version of Android 14.