Google changing the way Android Apps you download google play store Massive in August. For starters, Google is killing the APK file format. This does not mean that all existing APK-based files and apps will stop working. However, all new apps that are published on the Google Play store are in . have to be in AAB Format or Android App Bundle. Google first talked about AAB in 2018 and now it’s finally implementing it. As for the APK format, Google is offering it a slow death.
Before getting into what AAB actually is, note that the move is aimed at making Android apps perform better in low-end phones. Plus, AAB apps will take up less storage.
What is Android App Bundle or AAB?
Android comes with support for over 100 languages, various CPU architectures such as- ARM v7, ARMv8 with Intel x86, and various screen resolutions. Now, an app developer needs to bundle support for this huge range of combinations into one APK app. This means that every app you download to your phone has a lot of unnecessary code resulting in bigger apps and consuming more storage space.
This is one of the biggest drawbacks of APK files and Google is trying to replace with the AAB format. With android app bundle (AAB), Google will use the “Split APK” and Google Play store will roll out the exact required code for your device and will not provide anything extra. If your device is based on ARMv8 CPU architecture, with AAB Google will only provide packages for ARM v8 when downloading a particular app, not the entire APK file with support for ARMv7, ARMv8 and Intel x86 architectures.
What is the advantage of using AAB
AAB will lead to smaller sized apps that perform better in Android phones with different hardware specifications. More importantly, it will help Google save money on bandwidth. For end users, they can expect maximum storage savings of 15%. So, with app bundles, instead of 100MB apps, it will be reduced to 85MB. But for Google, it means a lot. With app bundle google Expect to save petabytes of bandwidth every day.
Also, AAB will give Google more control of the Play Store. AAB is open source but a non-Google app store should have the ability to process apps on the cloud and distribute them to end users accordingly. For Google, that’s easy because it has its own “BundleTools” open source app to help with the process, but a third-party app store needs to set up its own cloud infrastructure and pay for servers and app signing. will need to be dealt with. This means that you can expect more developers to skip third-party app stores and opt for the Play Store instead if they want to distribute their apps across the vast Android ecosystem.
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