Purge Anarchy — Apple To Clean Up Its App Store

Apple to do a through clean up of its store this September.

As we’d written back in April (here’s the original article), Apple was taking the clean-up of their App Store very seriously.

Our subsequent article had explained the why’s and what’s of Apple’s intentions. Now, on Wednesday, September 7th, the day when they unveil their new iPhone: Apple is rumored to start its review of their App Store content, with the fittest and up-to-date App surviving the cut, while the others will be swept out of the store.

“To make it easier for customers to find great apps that fit their needs, we want to ensure that apps available on the App Store are functional and up-to-date”, the company said in a post on its developer site. “We are implementing an ongoing process of evaluating apps, removing apps that no longer function as intended, don’t follow current review guidelines, or are outdated”.

It is good news for consumers sick of wading neck deep in a flood of unwanted apps. According to a news agency, developers will be given 30 days to release an updated version of an app before it’s culled from the store.

A report from last year found that the top iOS developers averaged 45 days in between updates on average however smaller and indie developers may not have the resources to maintain quite as fast-paced a schedule. It is a reasonable expectation to have that an actively maintained app would at least be updated annually, or when a new iOS operating system is released or new hardware arrives. Most apps aren’t, though and they will get the sharp end of the cane.

There are 2.1 million active apps on the App Store worldwide however according to data from Adjust, a business intelligence firm for app marketers, developers have abandoned 50% of all apps since May 2015.
According to data from another app intelligence firm, Sensor Tower, 328,000 iOS apps haven’t been updated in three or more years.

With half the App Store potentially up for deeper examination, Apple’s marketplace could soon look a lot different, following the upcoming purge, with the emphasis being on quality over quantity. Meanwhile, Sensor Tower says that roughly 40% of apps were updated in the last three months, while 7.5% don’t support the iPhone 6 or newer devices.

“Quality is extremely important to us”, Apple said. “We know that many of you work hard to build innovative apps and update your apps on the App Store with new content and features. However, there are also apps on the App Store that no longer function as intended or follow current review guidelines, and others which have not been supported with compatibility updates for a long time. We are implementing an ongoing process of evaluating apps for these issues, notifying their developers, and removing problematic and abandoned apps from the App Store”.

There is another suggestion too: “App Names you submit in iTunes Connect for new apps and updates will now be limited to no longer than 50 characters”.
According to the company: “Search is one of the most frequently used methods for customers to discover and download apps from the App Store. In hopes of influencing search results, some developers have used extremely long app names that include descriptions and terms not directly related to their app and are not fully displayed on the App Store thus adding no user value.”

While the initiative will be enforced going forward in new apps and app updates submitted to ITunes Connect, the quality cleanup measure will likely result in some disgruntled developers when non-quality apps are removed.

Originally published at Chip-Monks.