The Amazon Appstore Is Finally Dead On Android - Thank Goodness

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What could have been one of the biggest alternative app stores is finally shutting down on Android. Amazon originally shared plans to kill off the Android-based Amazon Appstore back in February of 2025, with the cut off date for support set for August 20, an FAQ posted to the company's website notes. That means that the Amazon Appstore is now effectively dead on Android, and to be honest, it's probably for the best despite the extra grip it will give Google on apps.

The Amazon Appstore first started garnering attention when it appeared on Android devices over 10 years ago, with a plan to offset Google's monopoly as the only on-device app distributor available for Android customers. However, since that time, the Google Play Store has only continued to grow.

While Amazon's app store still sees a good bit of usage on its own first-party Android-based devices — like its Fire tablets — the wider Android audience hasn't been relying on it based on what Amazon told Android Police around the time of the original announcement. The shutdown of the Amazon Appstore on wider Android devices follows the company's step away from supporting its Windows app, too, which was discontinued in March of 2025.

It makes sense that Amazon's Appstore sees more usage on its first-party devices, but it also seems a bit strange that Amazon didn't see wider success with the app store in recent years, especially after a judge ordered Google to open up Android to third-party app stores last year. It's clear there's a want and a need for alternatives to Google's Play Store.

And Amazon has always had a good deal going for it — thanks to the Amazon Coin program, which allowed users to earn or purchase coins they could then use to purchase apps. The company even offered paid apps for free as part of special limited-time events pretty often. Thankfully, any coins still in your balance at the time the app shuts down will be refunded, Amazon says, so anyone who has still been using the app won't have to worry about missing out on any money they've already spent.

Additionally, any apps downloaded through the Amazon Appstore will no longer be supported, so if you own an app through the store, you'll want to look into downloading it from the Play Store or grabbing it from another alternative app store.

The good news, if you like the Amazon Appstore, is that it isn't dead forever. Instead, the company says that it wants to prioritize improving it for its own devices, instead of having to worry about keeping it running smoothly on the wider Android builds, too. To be honest, this is a move that makes sense, especially as Android devices continue to offer different experiences across different manufacturers.

The biggest downside here, of course, is that one of the biggest alternatives is now dead for most Android users. Since the Fire phone's failure, the company has remained clear of the smartphone market. That means Google's grip on Android apps has become even tighter. Though, I'm not sure being in Amazon's hands when it comes to app access is any better than Google's. 

While I'm personally happy to see the Amazon Appstore dead on Android, I don't want to see Google with an even stronger stranglehold on how we access new apps. I'm hopeful that this new power vacuum will open room for another alternative to grow. I'd love to see more app stores like the Aurora Store, which is both open source and safe to use, but also strives to keep user's data out of the hands of big tech like Google and Amazon.