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Is there any way to unpublish and then permanently remove an application from the list of applications on Android Developer Console?

Vadim Kotov
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Rafael
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    A hack around completely deleting an app from the store is violating one of the rules but this can bring about more consequences. – Thecarisma Jan 17 '20 at 10:04
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    The best workaround to remove your application is to migrate or transfer that app to another google play account!!! – Sandip Savaliya Oct 12 '20 at 12:18
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    I’m voting to close this question because https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/272165/are-developer-centric-questions-about-application-stores-on-topic – Zoe Apr 23 '21 at 15:24
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    I wish Google Play would stop giving me warning about things in unpublished apps! – Yetti99 Jul 30 '21 at 14:35

12 Answers12

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No, you can unpublish but once your application has been live on the market you cannot delete it. (Each package name is unique and Google remembers all package names anyway so you could use this a reminder)

The "Delete" button only works for unpublished version of your app. Once you published your app or a particular version of it, you cannot delete it from the Market. However, you can still "unpublish" it. The "Delete" button is only handy when you uploaded a new version, then you realized you goofed and want to remove that new version before publishing it.

A reference

Update, 2016

you can now filter out unpublished or draft apps from your listing.

enter image description here

Unpublish option can be found in the header area, beside PUBLISHED text. Unpublish link

UPDATE 2020

Due to changes in the new play console, the unpublish option was moved to a different location as follows.
Click All Apps in the left pane. Then click the app you want to remove.

Then under the Setup option in the left pane, Click Advanced Settings.

Then under App Availablity on the right, change the status to UnPublished and click Save Changes at the bottom.

Take a look at the image below:
New UnPublish screenshot

Blundell
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  • sorry but if i unpublish, i can republish one day? – Zak Dec 10 '12 at 16:54
  • @Blundell That is quite a bad design - you say there is no way? What if we end up with more than 100 apps on that page when only 5 of them are published... – Liam W Dec 20 '12 at 20:43
  • I think Google should at least provide a way to hide them from the dashboard... Anyhow, thanks :) – Liam W Dec 20 '12 at 21:01
  • That is horrible. I uploaded the app, published it and realized that the name in which it is published is wrong, so I had to create a new account, and wanted to upload the same app there. But that I cannot do. So I have to change everything? Thats just lame. – Ted Feb 21 '13 at 22:48
  • @Ted: You can change the displayed name of the app if you want to - just not the package name. – Carl May 01 '13 at 08:16
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    one trick I use is to rename them to something like "Zzzzzxx" so they get sorted to the back. – Reuben L. May 24 '13 at 09:25
  • Hey @Reuben L., I am facing a problem,I published application and by mistake i uploaded old apk and I have also lost my old keystore file. So console is not accepting new apk with new keystore. Now whether i should unpublish app,and can i publish app again with same name and package or not. What better i could do..? – Dory Sep 12 '13 at 05:33
  • @nads: You can publish an app with the same name, but Play remembers package names. Best bet is to unpublish your first app, change the package name of your app, generate a new keystore, and republish under the same name. – stefannew Nov 22 '13 at 21:02
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    Google should put a hide feature – Rick Dec 10 '13 at 17:28
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    Unfortunately i published my apk in production mode but now i unpublished it and i want to publish it in alpha testers. when i tried this then production apk is publishing but not alpha, so how can i publish only alpha test release mode after publishing production apk?Is there any way to hide production apk and to publish alpha testers apk? – Shailendra Madda Dec 17 '13 at 06:34
  • I had published my app with incorrect app name hence I unpublished it.Now I am trying to publish my app with correct app name from different developer console account but I am not allowed to do it.I cannot change the package name of my app.What to do?Please provide suggestions. – Raj Trivedi Apr 17 '14 at 05:19
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    In other words, another move by Google to make you work for them, then not own your data that you created for them. – Henrik Erlandsson Oct 08 '14 at 06:34
  • If you still want open beta, but no published release, try this: - set you minSdkVersion to as high as possible (currently 25 is accepted by the play store, BUT no devices are compatible :p ). So you end up with an officially published app which will be just a dead entry with no possible installs. http://stackoverflow.com/a/39132307/4160084 – goodKode Aug 24 '16 at 20:15
  • What exactly do you mean with `live`? If an APK has only ever been uploaded to the Alpha channel, but never moved to public beta or production, does the same restriction apply? – Alexander Pacha Sep 20 '16 at 21:43
  • If you want to be sure your app is hidden from the store for at least (99% of people), just restrict it for a little country in the world, in the price and availability section. – Fantasim Dec 11 '19 at 14:22
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    Google really needs to add a delete feature because this is in high demand and frankly is getting annoying. I’ve dead app listings sitting there doing nothing. – Saifur Rahman Mohsin Sep 07 '20 at 09:54
  • Google UI & UX has never been its strong suit hahahah – WilliaGuy May 05 '21 at 14:48
  • I don't understand the difference between deleting and unpublishing. Can users still get to an app that has been unpublished? – d512 Mar 10 '23 at 20:29
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Select Store Presense then Pricing Distribution and select Unpublish from App Availability. enter image description here

Google's help for this is here: https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/113476#unpublish (as of Feb-2020)

mm2001
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HuyLe
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you can remove an App from the store or "Unpublish" by clicking a tiny label bellow your app's title, right side of the "PUBLISHED" green status label.

enter image description here

Works even if your app was live (published) for long time, mine was.

Regards.

Jhollman
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enter image description here

From Google Play Console, Select your app. Select Store Presence and select Pricing and Distribution from the side menu. There is a toggle switch to Publish and Unpublish app. Select UnPublish and click Submit Update Button in the top right corner.

Sonia John Kavery
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Actually it is now partially possible: https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9023647

Updates to reports

In late May 2018, you may begin to see changes in your app's metrics based on your users' deletion of data. Some metrics are calculated based on data from users who have agreed to share their data with developers in aggregate.

The metrics that we provide in the Play Console are adjusted to more closely reflect data from all of your users. However, Google will not display data that falls under certain minimum thresholds.

Delete an app or game

You can permanently remove draft apps or games from your Play Console. You can also delete:

  1. Published apps or games that haven't been installed on any devices
  2. Published apps or games that no users are entitled to re-install

In these cases, contact our support team to request that your app's or game's data be permanently deleted.

deadfish
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    The support team replied to my deletion request with more details of the app deletion requirements: 1) App must be in good standing (not rejected, suspended, or otherwise removed). 2) App must have 0 lifetime installs. 3) App must be unpublished for 24 hours (to ensure 0 installs) – Jaween Sep 04 '18 at 14:03
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Note: Adding a new answer as the publish/unpublish option is moved to different location.

As mentioned in other answers you cannot delete the app. With updated Google Play Console (Beta), the Unpublish option is moved to different location:

Setup -> Advanced Settings -> App Availability

Enable Published / Unpublished accordingly!

enter image description here

Gokul Nath KP
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No, you cannot delete the application once you have published it in Google Play. Google will keep all the apk files. But you can unpublish the version, if you dont want that version to be availaible to user.

Sanal Varghese
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The one exception worth noting is that while you can't delete apps, the folks over at Google Play Developer Support are able to on their end if the app is both unpublished and has 0 lifetime installs. So if your app has 0 lifetime installs, you might be in luck.

First you will need unpublish the app and wait 24 hours (to allow global stats to update and ensure that no last-minute installs happened). Assuming no last-minute installs happen over those 24 hours, you can contact Google Play Developer Support and check to see if they can delete it.

Please note that their requirement for 0 installs is a hard requirement. No exceptions can be made (not even if you installed the app yourself for testing purposes).

smik
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You can't delete the app , but you can unpublish it . By doing so , it won't be available in play store but the user having your application will still be able to use your app .

Steps to follow to un-publish your app : To unpublish your app on the Google Play store:

  1. Go to https://market.android.com/publish/Home, and log in to your Google Play account.
  2. Click on the application you want to delete.
  3. Click on the Store Presence menu, and click the “Pricing and Distribution” item.
  4. Click Unpublish
Mini Chip
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  • Thank you! It didn't occur to me that unpublishing a free app is a sub-category of pricing. I guess I'll never think like google. – SMBiggs Apr 22 '20 at 22:31
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Once app is published once it cannot be deleted from the listing in your console, but rather you can unpublish it only and if you want you can use the filters to hide it from the listing, but the draft apps you can delete them or hide them.

Mohammad Haidar
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There is strictly no service provided yet from Google Store to delete/remove production app and also you can't change production build for best test.

Maveňツ
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Once application is made live by publishing it then you can't delete it, although Unpublished apps can be deleted using "Delete app" button as shown :

enter image description here

Aqib Mumtaz
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    on the screenshot we see that Store Listing and Content Rating are not done yet. This means the app hasn't been published yet. For published apps "Delete" option is unavailable. – activity Mar 07 '16 at 17:02
  • correct, its written above screenshot that "Unpublished apps can be deleted using "Delete app" button" – Aqib Mumtaz Mar 08 '16 at 07:21
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    "Unpublished" and "Not-yet-published" are very different and the question says, "to unpublish and then permanently remove" which addresses the "was published" not the "not-yet-published" scenario so your answer isn't applicable to the question even though it is correct and could be helpful to someone dealing with a not-yet-published application. – rainabba Apr 05 '16 at 16:20