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I have a new Android app with several released updates. From reasons I couldn't understand, on Google Play different phones see different app versions.

The differences between version are minor bug fixes, nothing that should cause that. The compileSdkVersion 22 minSdkVersion 16 targetSdkVersion 22

  • 24H has passed since the last update.

Any advice?

AYBABTU
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  • If a device is not supported by your update, it may not be allowed to update, in which case I believe the Play Store will hide those updates from the user, causing them to only see the most recent version that is relevant to their device. I can't imagine you added anything in your "minor bug fixes" update that would cause this, but might be worth double checking. – NoChinDeluxe Nov 06 '15 at 15:04
  • Thanks, so I did that and the devices I checked are supported - not sure why that happens. Some devices see even older versions on the Play Store. – AYBABTU Nov 06 '15 at 15:08
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    You might have changed the `minsdkversion` in your new version. – Vishavjeet Singh Nov 06 '15 at 15:13

1 Answers1

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The issue has sorted itself out though I would like to post here what happened and all other scenarios I've encountered.

  1. After an app is published, the app's version on the web-play-store would be different then on the device and would be different between different devices. This would sort itself out sometime between 20h-30h after the publish was approved.
  2. Another reason for version inconsistency could be minSdkVersion, compileSdkVersion & targetSdkVersion which determins min & max supported API version which translated to supported Android Versions. If you launched an app with minSdkVersion=16 and targetSdkVersion=compileSdkVersion=22 then it would not supported android 4.0.x (API ver 15, see reference). Then if you publish an update but change targetSdkVersion=compileSdkVersion=21 then most devices would be updated and you'd see the expected version though you didn't support API Level 22 (Android 5.1) so from devices with that Android Version you'd see the older version on the Play Store.
  3. Last thing to notice is 'Supported devices', under 'APK' on 'Google Play Console'. If a device was supported and a version update did not support it, you might see the older version on the store. i.e. Tablet support.

Hope that helps.

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AYBABTU
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