A year ago, I would say that
iOS. Just because of the more understandable structure and smaller fleet of
devices, and this saves on testing and time. But now I’ll answer exactly that
Android. Recently, Google has simply added a ton of indispensable tools to the
developer console, which are not found either in iTunes Connect (Apple’s
developer console) or elsewhere.

Recently, Apple has also begun
to turn its face to the developers, they are constantly adding something to the
console, but I have the feeling that the logic and intuitiveness of iOS is a
merit of a completely different team, and someone unfamiliar with the concept
is designing the Apple developer console Usability.

It is braking, crooked,
uncomfortable, and the information that you can see there is usually incomplete
or scattered in all corners. What is the latest innovation – to separate the
fields for entering the name and keywords. Both that and another – search
engine optimization tools that work together, and now you have to jump between
them, which is also difficult because of the need to save data during the
transition. The person who invented this clearly doesn’t understand how the
developer operates the application.

And there are many such
dubious moments. Is there anyone else who is annoyed by the default checkmark
“you need a special account to access all the functions of the
application”?

But the Google Developer
Console now has almost everything in order to test, conduct experiments and
increase the effectiveness of the mobile application.

Experiment Tool

My favorite tool. Allows you
to conduct A / B tests of marketing materials. You can take several different
sets of screenshots, banners, descriptions, icons, and so on and see which set
works more efficiently, and then select it. The tool is not perfect, but it is
the best and only free solution for the developer on the market.

If you still started with iOS,
then Splitmetriсs will help you. You will be given one experiment for free,
then it will cost $ 250 per month. In my opinion, mercilessly.

Alpha testing

Add a mailbox to the tester and
the console will generate a test link where you can download a test version of
the game. Nontrivial, be careful. It works only if you use the Chrome browser
on the device, and not the old Internet.

ITunes Connect has an
analogue, Testflight. It works in much the same way, it only uses Safari to
complete the registration process (be careful: if you follow the link directly
from the mail application, you will see an error; you must open it on the device
in Safari). To download the test version on the device, you have to download
the application of the same name from the App Store. At one time, I killed a
couple of days, trying to figure out how this works.

Beta testing

Allows you to open the
application to a limited number of users, without outputting to the general
release. Apple also has it, but, as always, with a huge “but”: as testers you
cannot add a mailing address if it is already registered as a developer in
another account.

View-to-download conversion information

This is also with Apple.
Allows you to understand whether everything is fine with screenshots,
description, icon and so on. Looking ahead, I’ll say that the average
conversion is 10%, often less for games. The maximum I know is 65%.

If the conversion is low,
change all the marketing, do A / B tests, keep up to the last moment. This is a
key indicator for the success of your project. There is simply nothing more
important (except for user retention).

Quick approval

Takes no more than six hours.
Apple has recently finally reduced the application review time to two days.
Hallelujah! There is an unverified feeling: if you go out on Friday or
Thursday, there is a chance that this time will be reduced to a few hours. I
got a game a couple of times two hours after the uploading. Previously, even an
expedited review didn’t produce such a result.

Crash and unexpected application close (ANR)
statistics

It doesn’t work on
cross-platform, unfortunately, but otherwise useful. Just watch them not
through “Failures and ANR”, but through the following path: “Statistics”>
“Failures for the day”> “Details of failures”. I don’t know why, but it is
this path that opens up the necessary details that can be used. By the way,
Google Analytics also added glitches six months ago. They are detailed there
and even work on iOS.

The ability to respond to
comments on the application

This sometimes allows you to find out the
problem place and clarify the details with the user. Because users always write
something like “Nothing works for me!”, And this is definitely not enough for
you to fix the problem. A good tool, however, users respond very rarely.

All marketing goes through
the approval process only when a new build is being published

If you change only marketing (description,
screenshots, etc.), then new ones will appear on Google Play within an hour or
two and automatically. This is sometimes critical in the early stages, when
marketing will be the main object of your experiments and changes, and you have
no opportunity to collect a new build every two days.

At Apple, you can update only the
description without a new build. Everything else – only with the new version of
the application. The only plus is that you can freely change marketing while
the application is waiting for a review, but there is a trap here: after
sending a new version to a review, you will no longer be able to add
localization.

Notification Testing

Added a couple of months ago. Quite a controversial
utility, it shows little, but helps to verify the correctness of the keys (and
there are already four of them).

Test Report

This is testing on live devices (added
recently). Awesome thing. It starts automatically as soon as you release the alpha
or beta version. Scripts are run that perform basic operations such as launch,
scrolling, typing. It is free. Even screenshots will be shown to you from
tested devices. If you want more complete tests, welcome to the Firebase Test
Lab in the same place, but this is already paid.

ITunes Connect either doesn’t have these
tools, or the analogues are inconvenient. Well, or I didn’t have the strength,
patience and time, like with Testflight, to figure out how it works. For
example, I see that I have 100 failures – of course, I want to fix them right
away, click on a number, and they show me a graph. Why do I need it? I need a
crash log to fix it quickly, but I could not find it. Perhaps more savvy
colleagues will help? I will be very grateful.

Therefore, if you are a beginner or just a sane
person who believes that any project at the start is a test sample that
requires analysis, improvements and increased efficiency in all possible ways,
then only the Google Play Developer Console (GPDC) will give you almost all the
tools to bring the application to “as-it-should-be” condition.