Google announces Best of Play Store lists for apps, games, movies, music, and more for 2015
Google Play Store publishes lists of the best apps and best games of 2015 — Let the year-end roundups begin. Google is fully on board with this phenomenon, back again with the annual list of the best apps and games for the Play Store.
Context & Ripple Effects
The Best of Play Store lists are Google's entry into year-end editorial curation, arriving alongside its I/O-era push to make the storefront more than a download counter. What looks like a seasonal roundup is actually the first data point in a longer arc: within eighteen months Google had moved from one-off December lists to always-on merchandising.
First-order effects
- Featured apps and games get an immediate visibility spike on the Play Store's front page, with Google acting as the taste-maker deciding which of millions of listings get surfaced.
- Developers now have a concrete new target beyond raw install counts: making an editorial shortlist becomes a marketing asset in its own right.
Second-order effects
- Google formalizes the instinct permanently — by mid-2017 it launches Android Excellence curated collections, turning the annual list into a standing showcase for top apps and games.
- In the same window Google retunes discovery itself, updating the Play Store algorithm so games are promoted on continued user engagement rather than installs, aligning machine ranking with what the human-picked lists were already rewarding.
Third-order effects
- App store distribution shifts structurally away from download-chart meritocracy toward a layered system where editorial curation and engagement signals jointly determine which developers win shelf space.
- That raises the bar for small studios: visibility increasingly depends on retention quality and curatorial fit rather than launch-week install spikes, reshaping how mobile developers budget for user acquisition.
The trend: App stores are evolving from search-and-charts utilities into curated, engagement-ranked platforms where Google and Apple's editorial picks increasingly shape which apps succeed.