Apple says it's now handicapping its own apps in App Store search results after analysis finds they have ranked first for at least 700 search terms
If you opened the App Store on an iPhone in May 2018 and typed “podcast” in the search box, you would have seen something like this.
New York Times
Context & Ripple Effects
The groundwork was laid years ago: Apple's 2015 search algorithm update made the App Store return results even when the keyword matched no metadata or title, widening what the ranking system could surface. A July 2019 analysis then found Apple's own apps ranked first in over 60% of test searches — including Podcasts at #1 despite a 1.7-star rating before its reviews were removed.
Apple's announcement that it will now handicap its own apps lands between two pressures documented in the coverage: the Epic trial later surfaced an email suggesting Apple had manually boosted its Files app over Dropbox in 2017, which Apple called a mistake, and Apple has separately committed to rolling out more App Store ads in 2026. Self-preferencing in search is now both a public-relations liability and a live antitrust exhibit.
First-order effects
Developers whose categories overlap those 700-plus terms — podcast clients foremost among them — gain organic visibility Apple's own apps previously occupied by default.
Podcasts loses its default #1 placement for podcast-related searches, forcing it to compete on merit against third-party apps with stronger ratings.
Second-order effects
The concession hands ammunition to litigants and regulators: Apple can now be measured against its own stated standard, making any future manual boost — like the one alleged for Files versus Dropbox — harder to dismiss as a mistake.
With Apple expanding search ads in 2026, demoting first-party organic results reshuffles the paid inventory beneath them, changing what advertisers bid on in the slots freed up.
Third-order effects
If the pattern holds, gatekeepers facing scrutiny increasingly concede self-preferencing voluntarily before regulators impose parity rules — making first-party demotion a template other platform owners may copy preemptively.
App Store search solidifies as the decisive distribution chokepoint on iOS, where ranking policy — organic or algorithmic — carries the weight that storefront placement once did in physical retail.
The trend: Platform owners are retreating from first-party self-preferencing in their own search results as that behavior shifts from a design choice to a regulatory and litigation target.
“There's nothing about the way we run search in the App Store that's designed or intended to drive Apple's downloads of our own apps,” Apple's Phil Schiller said. “We'll present results based on what we think the user wants.” @jacknicas @collinskeith https://www.nytimes.com/...
In July Apple tweaked its App Store search algorithm so that Apple's own apps wouldn't consistently top others, but insists it wasn't a “correction” because it wasn't a mistake to begin with 🤔 https://www.nytimes.com/... pic.twitter.com/1DsWztU1p6
New from @jacknicas and me: How Apple Stacked the App Store With Its Own Products — an analysis of search rankings of more than 1,800 apps across 13 keywords since 2013, using data from @SensorTower https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
We analyzed six years of App Store search results and found a clear theme: Apple has been the overwhelming winner for many common searches, even when its apps were less relevant and less popular than rivals'. https://www.nytimes.com/...
@trippmickle and The Wall Street Journal also did a great job analyzing this issue, finding that Apple apps regularly ranked first in an analysis of 600 searches in June. https://www.wsj.com/...
The executives said Apple turned that feature off in July so Apple apps would no longer look favored. Many Apple apps dropped as a result. But they denied there had been a problem that needed fixing. “It's not corrected,” Mr. Schiller said. “It's improved,” said Mr. Cue.
The App Store search results are some of the most fought over real estate in the digital economy. In that fight, Apple is the lone referee — and one of the biggest competitors. How Apple controls the App Store is now at the heart of antitrust complaints in the U.S. and Europe.
Seems a bit stupid for Cue to say it wasn't a mistake that searching for “podcast” in the App Store would show the Compass app as the second result. https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Nine times out of ten I feel like fancy animated story graphics are gratuitous journalism awards fodder but this one is great and damning. I think it's because you know how much you scroll and you're thinking “I would never have scrolled this far” https://www.nytimes.com/...
Really interesting analysis of how Apple's own apps have sometimes dominated the App Store, even when they're not related to what people searched for. Crazy that Stitcher, a major podcast company, doesn't even rank in App Store search results!!! https://www.nytimes.com/...