Google clears up: Number of apps in the Play Store reduced to almost half

Google has apparently organized massive spring cleaning in the Play store in the past 12 months. According to data from the app intelligence provider Apppfigige, Google’s app marketplace has lost 47 percent of its apps so far since the beginning of 2024. A year ago, the Play Store still had around 3.4 million apps on offer – now there are still 1.8 million.

Cleaning up in the Play Store: Google wants more quality

According to the apple figure, the decline in the app offer is not part of a larger global trend. Because in the same period, the number of applications in Apple’s app store for iOS slightly increased from 1.64 million. But Apple also performed a cleanup: In February 2025, the iPhone manufacturer removed a comparatively manageable Number of 137,000 apps From the app offer.

The background of the clean -up campaign should be Google’s increase in the minimum quality requirements for apps in the Play Store, which the company announced in July 2024. With the new quality offensive, apps should not only fly from the Play Store that crash, cannot be installed or not properly executed. The company also prohibited apps that have “limited functionality and content” to offer.

These include static apps without further functions such as PDF viewers. Applications that offered only one background image, for example, have flown out. Apps without any function are also undesirable that could be tests or other developer gimmicks.

Opposite Techcrunch operated Google, that the new guidelines play a role in reducing the app offerings. The company added that “extended verification requirements, mandatory app tests for new personal developer accounts and expanded human reviews to find apps that try to deceive or cheat” were used for cleaning up.

2.4 million “Bad Apps”

Google also pointed out that the company was able to avert the publication of 2.36 million against the guidelines in 2024. In addition, Google blocked more than 158,000 developer accounts that tried to publish harmful apps.

With Google, reducing the apps offer could be a certain relief for owners of Android devices. In addition to reputable and multi -quality apps, the range of the Play Store also includes fraudulent and otherwise qualitatively inferior applications. Developers are also likely to benefit from the approaching halving of the app offerings, since their apps may now be easier to find.