Apple has always been more selective about the applications it allows to appear in the App Store. The company famously approves every single one, which is why it takes longer to get an iOS app out the door than it does Android. Now Google is introducing a review process of its own, though the company says it shouldn’t have any impact on how quickly your app goes to market.
In a post published today on the Android Developers Blog, Google announced two changes to the Play Store. One is an age-based rating system to aid developers in the labelling of their applications. This will be based on a content rating questionnaire for each app (to be filled out by the developer) and official ratings from the IARC and its participating bodies, the ESRB, the PEGI, the Australian Classification Board, USK and ClassInd.
The second and more significant change is the incorporation of a review process that Google hopes will improve the Android app catalogue. Google says its team of experts will review each app looking for violations of its developer policies.
“We value the rapid innovation and iteration that is unique to Google Play, and will continue to help developers get their products to market within a matter of hours after submission, rather than days or weeks,” Google said.
The good news is that Google actually started the process “several months ago” so its assurances that developers should see no noticeable change to the rollout of their app seems to run true. As part of this new process, Google will also now offer developers additional insight into why apps are rejected or suspended. This will mean they can more quickly rectify the issues and resubmit their apps for approval.
[source]Google[/source]
