Aptoide App Store

What it feels like to be free and prosper in the app world

The most common reason why startups fail is that they don't start. That’s how a research project in 2009, already named Aptoide, would one day become one of the biggest app stores in the world. By starting. By being disruptors. That is, by identifying a problem with an existing business or service and finding a way to make it more accessible, fast, cheap and efficient.

At the time the first Android phone, the G-1, showed up, along with Android Market - the original version of Google Play -, an opportunity was born. With Aptoide, you didn’t need to sign up for an account like you had to with Android Market. You were free to access all apps and games without the straightjacket of Google. You were also not being geolocated - and besides had a ton more apps and games available than in Market.

The name is Open, Open Source

Aptoide is part of the open source movement from the beginning, and the app store, in a sense, is the fullest expression of that vision -

2011 brought the first million of active users, and the research project turned into a global business. The timing was perfect - it was the early days of the smartphone and of a new hyperconnected, multimedia world - and the app store grew fast. Spain, Latin America, the US, Europe, Asia: these were Aptoide’s first turbo-markets.

The existential threat as opportunity

As Aptoide the parent company attracted local and international investors and opened offices in Singapore and China, the app store was on a roll, with ad revenue growing at high speed. That’s what made the sudden 2014 advertising crash - when Aptoide lost 85% of its revenue following Google’s well-documented, court-punished attack - so painful.

In fact, it could have been an existential threat for Aptoide, were it not for the team’s reaction. Immediately, there was an alternative solution - developing the CPI network. Eight weeks after the ad collapse, revenue was spiking again. The answer was different but the overall trend was the same - onwards and upwards.

A better modelFrom 2017, Aptoide fine-tuned the strategy for the app store. The model is to direct users to the store and the network of partner app stores where Aptoide’s content is distributed. This makes both for better control of the user experience and for much more granular and wider reach, knowing that different users may require different solutions.Partner stores include global brands such as:
2011
1Mactive users
2011 brought the first million of active users, and the research project turned into a global business. The timing was perfect - it was the early days of the smartphone and of a new hyperconnected, multimedia world - and the app store grew fast. Spain, Latin America, the US, Europe, Asia: these were Aptoide’s first turbo-markets.
2022
430M+
active users
In total, combining the app store and partner stores that use Aptoide’s content and services, the company is now one of the big global players by number of active users - over 430M in 2022.
The app store is really the heart of Aptoide.Companies are built on logic. Brands are built on emotion. A good product and a great team are what connects one with the other. That is Aptoide’s app store, front and back.
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