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The story goes like this: Recently I tried to make an Android watch face app. I made the watch module and added a blank mobile module so it could be installed on a smartphone without the need of smartwatch connected to it (Watch module would be installed as soon as the watch pairs with the phone). Everything worked fine on the Emulator so I tried to deploy the watch face on to the Google Play Store. At first it worked fine but as it was uploaded I couldn't find the app with my smartphone, even on the publisher screen. As I opened the Play Store page over the Developer Console on my Smartphone, the Play Store said: "Not working on your device". That is the first issue. The second issue is that I tried to get the app on to the watch Play Store so I requested that. A few days later I got the answer from Google: The app doesn't fulfill the quality standards. Then I send them an email, trying to figure out what exactly was wrong. In the answer email they attached a picture where there was an Android watch with the blank mobile module on it. Now I am wondering why this has happened. As I said it did not happen on the emulator.

TofferJ
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Tim Teuber
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  • Why do you have "a blank mobile module"? Why not just make the watch app standalone? https://developer.android.com/training/wearables/apps/standalone-apps – Sterling Feb 15 '19 at 20:09
  • @String Because i want it to be installed on a smartphone, so it could be downloaded on the normal Playstore – Tim Teuber Feb 16 '19 at 10:17
  • And to be more specific, i tried this at first first but than the app got rejected totally by google – Tim Teuber Feb 16 '19 at 12:08

2 Answers2

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It really sounds like your companion phone app is why it's being rejected; I expect the app review folks are taking a dim view of your "blank mobile module". Since (roughly) 2016, that's not how Wear apps have been distributed.

The expectation as of 2019 is that your Wear app will be installed via the Play store on the watch. In Google's view, all Play store clients are equal: there is no "normal" Play store on the phone (versus an abnormal one on the watch?).

There's also no mechanism for installing a standalone app to the watch from the phone. This is a shortcoming of the platform that's been discussed at length in the Wear OS dev community, and we've never found a good workaround.

So, the answer to your question is to not use multi-APK distribution unless you have a real phone app. Build only the watch APK - making sure it targets watch hardware - and create a release on your Play console containing only that APK.

Sterling
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Not sure if I'm correct, but the thing that got my attention was 'Android watch with the blank mobile module on it'. It should never be available to install mobile module on watch, unless the mobile module for some reason also uses: If thats the case you can try to remove it, and use multiApk to publish the app.

promanowicz
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