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Developing for Android is rough. Sure, it’s a huge, surging market that is quickly overtaking the smartphone industry. That’s all good, and it means money for Google, cellphone carriers and the device manufacturers. However, the developers are still hurting in the end, this despite the rising popularity of the Android OS.
Let’s take a look at why Android development is a tough business to get into:
1) The Payments Are Still a Pain – We, as well as many others, have hammered on about this one in the past. But there’s good reason for that. It’s because it hasn’t gotten any better. There is no truly efficient way to pay for your Android Apps. Many are available on the Android Market, others through developer websites, and so on. What this makes is a situation in which developers don’t always have a proper means of distribution, and promotion may also be tough to come across.
Compare this to the design of the App Store. Despite the annoyingly tight restrictions set by Apple, it’s hard to deny that developers can find success here. We’ve seen it many times in the past, and we will continue to see it. This is because many users already have an Apple ID, and some have had it for almost ten years. Users are already comfortable with a purchase knowing that Apple is the only party they have to give their credit card number to. Combined with 99-cent purchases, it’s a perfect storm for impulse purchases.
Even as recently as June of this year, we’ve heard of users having problems with the Android Market. Some Apps weren’t showing up amongst other things, and Google apologized for the problem soon after they were able to resolve it.
2) Purchase Choices Have Become Fragmented - Because of the payment systems, the way users purchase their apps has become fragmented. We remember a while back hearing about users being able to pay for Apps directly through their carrier billing. Yeah, that sounded like a mess. Meanwhile, outlets like Amazon have launched their own Android App Stores as well. More places to buy your Apps sounds like a good thing, until you realize that some users actually have no idea where to buy the Apps, because the distribution method has become so fragmented.
3) Android Devices Are O’Plenty - This initially sounds like a good thing. Because Android is available to any device manufacturer who wants it, you’d think it means more chances to sell, right? Well, that much is true, but the catch is this: Developers may not know what they are creating software for. Because Android OS can come on a variety of devices, many with an array of different specs, it’s impossible for a developer to know exactly who or under what conditions someone may use their application. A game running on that EVO may not work well on your Droid. There is very different hardware running across the phones equipped with Android, and many of those, as well as the software that shipped on the phone comes into account.
Here’s a quote by developer Steve Demeter, who created Trism for the iPhone, “Do I want to be spending 6 months to write the game, and another 6 months making if compatible? If I had Trism available for Android, and there are 50 Android devices and every time one of them crashes (the users) contact me, do I want that?” Though the quote is a little more than two years old, it still holds very true (in fact, more so) today.
Meanwhile when you develop on an iOS device, you have a very specific range of hardware specs to work with.
4) To Users, Google Often Means ‘Free’ – Many of the services provided by Google are free. That goes for their email client, their OS and their applications. Matt Hall, co-founder of mobile developer Larva Labs, recently went on the record as saying, “Google is not associated with things you pay for, and Android is an extension of that. You don’t pay for Google apps, so it bleeds into the expectations for the third-party apps, too.” Because users are used to getting things for free, it’s hard to find a way to charge them. This creates a vicious cycle of more apps being released for free for that very reason, furthering expectations of free software.
5) Paid Apps for Android Are Only Available in 32 countries, 90 for App Store – The New York Times pointed out this bit of information. This was said to be part of why developer Rovio, famous for Angry Birds, chose to go with a free, ad-supported app for Android. There was concern for Rovio that people who were not able to purchase the game would simply pirate it. The App Store sells software across 90 countries, making for many more opportunities to sell.
Will It Get Better?
Google has said that they are working on ways to improve how purchased apps are paid for. This would allow developers to make more money as well as increase popularity of the Android Store. Currently, it’s difficult to commit to developing on a limited budget if there is very little chance of making a profit. As it is, it’s difficult to succeed on Apple’s App Store, that difficulty is only amplified with Android applications.
Right now, Google should be working to improve that aspect if they hope to keep app makers interested in their platform, in turn, making users interested in what Android has to offer. We will see where Google takes distribution from here.
Currently, there are over 100,000 applications available through the Android Market, so there is definitely still an interest. The question is, how lon before developers are fed up?
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I was waiting for someone to write this article and I finally found yours.
For us (mobile game developer for past 6 yrs), Android is just an other headache. One advantage we see is the Market place, otherwise android is nothing but another headache for us.
One advantage on Apple’s devices, is we don’t have to put time on making the app compatible across various devices. Before android we had to port our game to 250 various devices, not the number has gone up wild. We still feel happy for Steve could understand our pain.
Is this article supposed to taken as anything more than a biased Op-Ed? Quoting issues from 2 years ago? Really? Against both markets, do some research on what % of app development iOs or android are making liveable incomes from their app sales. Its the consumer, not the OS.
Done some development on Android and I’d say the user expectations of apps being free is the biggest issue although the platform fragmenting is a close second. It’s a good platform to develop for but unrewarding. I’ve been redirecting my energy into iOS and while I don’t like the development tools as much, the lack of complication is more appealing to me now than ever. I hope someone figures out how to nail down these problems because, without restraining Android is ways that run counter to its open nature, I don’t see how anyone can. And that is going to be a serious problem.
http://larvalabs.com/blog/android/android-the-positives/
What seems to be the problem here is that the author looks to have never writen an application for Android, as he would know that points one and three are bunk.
For point two, yeah there are multiple sources from where a consumer can get his applications, but developers only have to publish to one. They are welcome to publish and charge for their application in other ways if they want to, although many choose to only publish to the Android Market. From how I’m reading this it appears as though you’re trying to make having a choice of how to sell applications a bad thing.
Point four is simply rediculous hyperbole. Many studies have been done showing that Android and iPhone users download a similar number of paid and free applications per unit time. Why do you make this assumption?
For point 5, you actually prove yourself wrong. Rovio was worried about people who could not purchase their application pirating it, so they chose to make money from their game using advertisements. Was their concern legitimate? Probably. But the fact is that they are still making money from their application.
Finally, why is an iPhone blog doing an article on Android? To get your fanbase riled up and filled with misinformation? Based on the final sentence in point five, it’s clear that the intent of this article is to steer people away from the android marketplace and towards Apple. If there are real reasons to steer people away from the Android Marketplace, then by all means do so, but you’re only doing your readership a disservice by trying to convince them that another completely viable source of income doesn’t exist.
Android users don’t even like ads in apps! I made an app that I thought was pretty good but it got bad ratings from users who were unhappy that it had ads! I am not guessing about this, they mentioned it in their comments.
Jeeze, google.com has ads.
just my personal opinion..i think android is good for businesses and it’s good for users. Here’s why:
1. Flexibility
Android’s primary distinguishing feature is the choice it affords its users, and that’s particularly valuable in a business setting
2. Then there’s the app factor. Whereas Apple’s App Store mostly offers the apps Apple has deigned to accept, the Android Market works more like a true capitalist system, whereby it’s up to developers to create what consumers demand.
3. Demand
Little wonder, then, that employees are demanding Android. Not only does it let them pick a device and carrier they like, but it also lets them customize their experience with a variety of custom ROMs and widgets.
I was looking for info on how developers view Android, in order to gauge how rapidly the apps would grow, I thought I had found it then I realized after I was redirected here that it’s the same apple misdirection and out lies. Congratulation boys this is evidence that ios is worried about Androids success when they have mislead the general populace about everything going on in Android
android rule now. it works great for me
well i am starting to look into other ways to easily manage the sales process across multiple platforms. one company i came across called Taurad seems to be making this easier to distribute, manage and bill customers.
There are thousands of ad supported games in the market that don’t have this problem. Maybe your game just wasn’t good enough to justify ads.
I doubt it’s that, there are always a small percentage of people who are just unhappy with everything for one reason or another. They’re just bitter souls, they’re largely the same people who use IRC. If it’s a paid app, they want a free version. If it’s free and ad supported, they hate the ads. I’d guess that Mike Jones is either focusing too much on a few bad comments, or he got unlucky and the very first comments were from these chronically bitter people.
You obviously aren’t in the app development business. Otherwise you’d know that this means jack squat to devs. Show us the MONEY.
And you obviously haven’t developed for iOS, otherwise you’d understand the points he was making and the contrast between his points, like the payment platform. Man, you Android fans really can’t take criticism.
And yes, I develop for BOTH platforms… pay on iOS and free with ads on Android.
I’m a developer for both platforms and this article is spot on. I have no idea what you are talking about… obviously not a dev…. like most of the idiots commenting on this good article.
if you’re a Android Developer you are an idiot
and deserves to be stolen!
ads on Android? LOL please…AGAIN if you are a android developer you are a IDIOT
Rob I hate to tell you but unless you have written an app or at least looked at the appstores for each platform then you’re lost in this discussion and your comment clearly shows you’re lost. Android is great if you don’t care about apps, and no developers aren’t making any money from android apps. I’ve tried two strategies, making great apps that had both paid and free versions. Paid versions were pirated and people complained about the ads in the free versions.
Then I made a few cheaper crappy apps with ads thinking this is what google wants, they want a flea market full of junk apps that use their advertising platform. And sadly I must say that actually worked somewhat better than making good useable apps. But still by better I mean a 25% increase, but a 25% increase on very tiny income is still a very tiny income.
I haven’t had any issues with my Android apps. I have had two of them developed by http://momentummobile.com. Both are doing great, and bringing in a decent amout of revenue. I’m not getting rich by any means, but it is a great supplement to my income.
I have to agree with Ethan on this one. I too develop for both ios and android and know for a fact, android users will not pay for anything. They are a different demographic to iPhone.
Android users tend to be male, geeky and would rather spend 3 hours getting a pirated version of an app than paying a dollar. I expect iPhone users are too busy living to bother and just buy the app!
If we assume a tap through rate of 0.2%, then it will take 500 ad views to get one tap on an ad. If the advertiser pays one cent per tap, that means it will take 50,000 ad views to earn one dollar. So unless your app is very successful, you won’t earn any money at all. As it stands now, Android development is basically a digital “sweat shop”. Android developers should form a class action lawsuit against Google to try to recover some of the millions of hours of unpaid wages they have Given to Google.