How to get more app downloads,
without guessing.
Most advice on how to get more app downloads is a list of tactics with no mechanism behind them. This is the mechanism: how app store optimization drives most of your organic downloads, the actual submission path for Apple’s editorial team, how Google Play decides what to feature without any nomination form at all, what Apple publishes about its own search ads, and how a referral loop turns existing users into new ones.
70%
of App Store visitors use search to find apps
65%
of downloads happen directly after a search
3 wks
minimum lead time Apple recommends for a nomination
$0
fee to submit an Apple featuring nomination
The short answer
Most app downloads come from people searching the store, so ranking for the right terms does more than any single campaign. On top of that, four channels actually move the number: getting featured (Apple has a real submission process, Google does not), paid search ads, and referrals from people already using your app. Each one runs on a different timeline, and none of them substitute for the others.
Four channels
Where downloads actually come from.
None of these four channels are secret. What’s missing from most advice is which one to reach for first, and what each one actually costs you: time, a specific kind of update, budget, or an existing user base.
| Channel | What it costs | Timeline | Who decides |
|---|---|---|---|
| App Store Optimization | Time, not budget | Weeks — rankings shift gradually | You |
| Editorial featuring | A genuinely notable update, plus lead time | Selection isn't guaranteed or scheduled by you | Apple or Google editors |
| Apple Search Ads | Cost-per-tap, budget you set | Days — ads run once a campaign is approved | You, inside Apple's auction |
| Referral program | An incentive per new user | Builds over time, compounds with your user base | You |
Try it
Which channel fits your situation right now?
Pick the closest match, and skip straight to the channel worth trying first.
App Store featured apps
How apps actually get featured on the App Store.
This is the part most articles get vague about, because until recently there wasn’t a public path. There is now: Apple lets developers formally nominate their app for editorial consideration through App Store Connect.
The submission path
In App Store Connect, open your app, go to Featuring, then Nominations, and create a nomination. You choose a type, write a detailed description of what’s changing and why it matters, attach up to five supplemental URLs (assets, documents, even a TestFlight link), and pick the date or window you’d like it considered for. Apple’s own guidance is to submit with a minimum lead time of three weeks. Editors then review it; there is no fee, and no guarantee it gets picked.
| Nomination type | Use it for |
|---|---|
| App Launch | A brand-new app, or a pre-order, going live |
| App Enhancements | New features, functionality, or a significant update |
| New Content | New content, an offer, or an in-app event |
What editors are actually judging
A nomination gets you considered, not featured. From Apple’s own submission guidance, the app itself still has to hold up: a crash rate under 1%, a design that reads as a natural iOS app rather than a ported layout, and a clear, specific angle the editorial team can actually write about. A “Helpful Details” field lets you add context Apple wouldn’t otherwise see, like the story behind the app or an accessibility improvement, and that context is exactly what turns a generic update into a featurable one.
Source: Apple’s App Store Connect featuring nomination guide.
Google Play
Google Play works the opposite way.
There is no nomination form for standard editorial featuring on Google Play. Google’s own developer guidance is explicit that featuring and increased discovery are decided by evaluating your app against a quality bar, not by a request you submit.
The four pillars Google evaluates
Core value
Solves a real, specific problem in an original way, not a copy of an existing pattern.
User experience
Intuitive, well-localized, accessible, and honest about monetization — no surprise interruptions.
Technical quality
Works well across the devices it supports, including tablets and foldables where relevant.
Privacy and security
Minimal permissions, transparent data handling, built for safety from the start.
On top of app quality, Google also weighs how strong your store listing and any promotional content are — the same store listing that App Store Optimization is aimed at improving. So the practical strategy for Google Play featuring isn’t a submission, it’s the same quality and listing work that improves your organic ranking anyway. There’s no separate move to make.
Source: Google’s Getting featured on Google Play guide.
At a glance
Apple vs Google, featuring side by side.
The two stores reward the same underlying thing — a genuinely good app — through almost opposite processes. Here’s the difference in one table.
| Aspect | Apple App Store | Google Play |
|---|---|---|
| How you get considered | Submit a formal nomination in App Store Connect | No submission — evaluated automatically and by editors |
| What it's judged on | Your nomination details, plus crash rate and design quality | The four quality pillars, plus your store listing |
| Lead time | 3 weeks minimum, recommended by Apple | No fixed window — quality has to hold up continuously |
| Cost to submit | Free | N/A — there's nothing to submit |
| Guarantee | None — editorial review decides | None — algorithmic and editorial evaluation decides |
Try it
Is your app ready for an Apple featuring nomination?
Check off what’s actually true today, based on what Apple asks for in App Store Connect.
0 of 6 · Start with the lead time and the crash rate — those two disqualify more nominations than anything else.
Paid search
What Apple publishes about its own search ads.
Featuring and rankings are not the only place search matters. Apple’s own apple search ads platform publishes the numbers that make the case for it: over 850 million people visit the App Store every week, about 70% of them use search to find apps, and almost 65% of downloads happen directly after a search. Ads placed at the top of search results convert at over 60% on average, since the targeting signal is someone’s actual search term, not a guess at their interests.
Pricing is cost-per-tap, so you only pay when someone taps the ad, and you set your own per-tap ceiling and daily budget. That makes it one of the few download channels where you can test with a small, controlled amount and read the result cleanly.
Source: Apple Ads, Apple’s official advertising platform for the App Store.
Referrals
The channel that compounds.
Every channel above stops the moment you stop paying for it or submitting to it. A working app referral program is different: it turns people who already downloaded your app into a source of new downloads, and it keeps working as your user base grows. It’s also the slowest of the four to get going, since it needs an existing base of users willing to share before it produces anything measurable.
The listing itself
None of this works with a weak listing.
Featuring gets people to your product page. Search ads get people to your product page. What happens next depends on the page itself: the icon, the screenshots, and the preview video. Get that part wrong and every channel above underperforms, because a tap that doesn’t convert to an install is a tap you already paid for or already earned. We won’t walk through the exact pixel dimensions here, since Apple revises them and it deserves its own reference — see app store screenshot sizes for the current spec.
Producing it by hand
- Capture, resize, and re-export screenshots for every device size
- Write and proof the store listing copy and keywords yourself
- Re-shoot everything when a screen or a feature changes
- Track which sizes and specs are current versus retired this year
Generated with Newly
- Screenshots and listing metadata generated from your actual app
- Sized to what Apple and Google currently expect
- Regenerated in minutes whenever the app changes
- One less blocker between a finished app and a submitted listing
Where Newly fits
None of this is a Newly feature, and that’s the point.
Getting more downloads is a distribution problem, not a product-building one, and no app builder can nominate you for Apple’s editorial team or write your referral copy for you. Where Newly is relevant is upstream of all of it: it is an AI app builder that turns a description into a real native app, built on React Native and Expo, that you own outright. If the off-the-shelf growth tools and templates don’t fit how your app actually works, that’s usually because the app itself needed something a template couldn’t give it, and that’s the gap Newly is built to close.
Newly starts at $25 a month, with iOS and Android deployment, real device simulators, and App Store screenshot and listing generation included.
FAQ
More app downloads, the quick answers.
You submit a nomination through App Store Connect, under Featuring > Nominations. You pick a type — New Content, App Enhancements, or App Launch — write a detailed description of what's changing, and choose a target date. Apple recommends submitting at least three weeks before that date. Editors then decide whether to feature it; there's no guarantee, and no fee involved.
Downloads follow the app. See what people build.
Before you invest in featuring, ads, or referrals, look at real apps built and shipped with Newly to see what a distribution-ready app actually looks like.