google play store technology

Google’s Play Store to now rank apps based on their 'performance'

appears to be getting stricter about apps on Google Play Store. The company has announced that it has now got an algorithm that will downgrade apps with bad reviews.

According to search giant, "As part of our continued effort to deliver the best possible Google Play experience, we recently enhanced our search and discovery algorithms to reflect app quality." It added, "This results in higher quality apps being surfaced in the Play Store more than similar apps of lower quality (eg: apps that exhibit more frequent crashes)."

10 most-popular Android apps in India

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10 most-popular Android apps in India

Mary Meeker's annual Internet Trends report is out. The 2017 edition of the report specially focuses on India's growing internet sector. It also names the 10 most-downloaded Android apps in the country. The India list of the most popular Android apps is primarily dominated by utility and social apps. Here's over to the 10 most-popular Android apps in India, as per Mary Meeker's annual Internet Trends report.

WhatsApp

Little guesses here. Facebook-owned messaging app WhatsApp is the top downloaded app in India, as per the report. The messaging app has managed to retain its last year's numero uno position. WhatsApp has over 200 million active users in India. The company recently announced that India tops the list in terms of countries consuming the maximum amount of video calling minutes. WhatsApp recorded a total of 340 million of video calling minutes per day globally. In addition, users made a total of 55 million video calls per day globally.

Facebook Messenger

At No. 2 position, according to the report, is another Facebook-owned app -- Facebook Messenger. The app has jumped one place in ranking, vis-a-vis its last year's position in Mary Meeker's latest Internet Trends report. Facebook recently made Messenger's game-playing features available to all its users. As announced during its F8 developers’ conference in April, the company is also introducing turn-based play with the ability for game makers to integrate leaderboards and tournaments.

SHAREit

Next on the list is a Chinese utility app SHAREit. The free file-sharing app was ranked at No. 5 position last year. SHAREit claims to be one of the fastest-growing mobile web companies globally, with 1 billion-plus registered users worldwide. The number of monthly active users stands at 400 million.

Truecaller

Next on the list is Sweden-based dialer app TrueCaller. The app, which ranked at No. 11 in last year's report, is at No. 4 position this year. The company recently added SMS and flash messaging to Truecaller. The update allows users to share pictures and loop in the same text, while chatting with friends. There's also speed flash messaging capability for distress situations, or during times when one needs to communicate quickly.

Facebook

Next on the list is the world's No. 1 social network - Facebook. Its official app has tumbled down to No. 5 in 2017's report, three places down from its second spot in 2016. According to Statista website, Facebook has 213 million users in India, as of April 2017. India ranks behind United States, which has 219 million users. Facebook is the most popular social network worldwide, with a global usage penetration of 22.9%, as per the website.

UC Browser

At No. 6th on Mary Meeker's 2017 Internet Trends report is another Chinese app UC Browser. The app, which comes from Chinese behemoth Alibaba, ranked at No. 4 last year. The app is available across platforms such as Android, iOS and Windows Phone. It had first toppled Opera in India in the year 2013.

MX Player

Next on the list is MX Player, a video player app from Korea. The app ranked at No. 13 in last year's ranking.

Hotstar

Internet-streaming platform Hotstar is next on the list. The streaming platform offers 50,000-plus hours of TV content and movies spread across eight languages. It is owned by Novi Digital Entertainment Private Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Star India Private Limited.

JioTV

Next on the list is Reliance Jio's JioTV. The app reportedly supports 454 channels, with the company adding 22 new channels recently. It has channels across multiple categories - business, devotional, entertainment, infotainment, kids, lifestyle, movies, music, news and sports.

Facebook Lite

At No. 10 on the list of most-downloadable apps is Facebook Lite, a stripped-down version of its main mobile app that's aimed at countries with poor internet connectivity. Earlier this year, the social networking giant rolled out Reactions to Facebook Lite app. Facebook also announced some India-specific camera effects for the app.

This means that apps that perform better will be ranked higher on Play Store than those who have a history of crashing and/or bad user ratings. Such apps will automatically be demoted.

The company claims that it has seen positive results of these changes. "The change has had a positive impact on engagement -- we've seen that people go on to use higher quality apps more and uninstall them less."

According to Google, "Developers focusing on performance can use the Play Console to help find and fix a number of quality issues." The company says thatAndroid vitals will help developers identify key performance issues, reported by opted-in devices which have their app installed, so that they can address them.

Google is increasingly working on improving the app quality on its app store. Recently, the company also said that it is using machine learning to identify apps that don't behave well. The technology giant has also created a new programme called 'Android Excellence' specifically to curate apps that - according to Google - are good and perform well.

Google Play Store revenue from India rises 3x in 2016

In a related news, Google also has been increasing its monetising efforts on itsIndia Play Store. According to, Google Play's director for business development Purnima Kochikar, "Consumer spending on apps has grown 3x in India over the past year. There is a real market here. Monetisation is just beginning in India."

The technology giant has also rolled out 'Made for India' app awards programme. The programme seeks to get developers to create apps that are low on memory usage, consume less data, work in patchy networks, and have content in local languages. These apps will be showcased in a special section in the store.

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