Google Introduces New Play Store Section
Google is updating its Play Store to include a new section that would present users with a free app for the week. The apps that will be featured in here are premium apps on regular days that will be free for the period that they appear in this section.
According to Venture Beat, Google wants to promote more Android apps to users, so it is expanding its Play Store to include a section for a weekly free app. The new feature will not be limited to the smartphone version of the Play Store since it can also be directly accessed via desktop and other mobile devices.
Android Police believes that Google launched this Free App of the Week section because it wants to better highlight the sales of paid apps. The move is also seen as an extension of what Google has implemented late last month that now allows paid apps and games to go on sale for a short period. Google is, after all, testing new sale features for the Play Store.
Once a paid app or game is picked up to be the Free App of the Week, it will appear in this section presumably for seven days. The icon will be displayed alongside the name and the star ratings of the application. The price of the app will also be shown, but for the period that it is featured in the section it will have a strikethrough. The word “FREE” is then placed beside it to clearly show users how much they are saving if they are downloading the app within the period that it is there for free.
The Free App of the Week section is already up, and the first free app Android users can take advantage of is Card Wars — Adventure Time from Cartoon Network. The game is up for grabs for $3.99 on regular days, but users can have it for free this week. Should this continue long-term, users will be getting 52 premium apps for free in a year.
Phandroid says that while this feature is not new to Apple given that the Cupertino giant likes to highlight various apps that have just been added to its App Store, this is something new to Google and it’s good news that it is making this kind of approach in promoting premium apps to users.
Google has added a new section to the Play Store that would present users with a free app for the week. Photo: Reuters/Kim Hong-Ji
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