Publishing PWAs on Alternative Android App Stores

While the Google Play Store is the primary distribution channel for Android applications, it is not the only storefront available to developers. Millions of Android devices globally run alternative app ecosystems, often pre-installed by hardware manufacturers or regional distributors. For Progressive Web App (PWA) developers utilising a Trusted Web Activity (TWA), expanding distribution to these alternative stores can unlock new audiences, lower acquisition costs, and bypass regional market limitations.

Understanding how alternative stores handle TWAs is essential. Because a TWA relies on a browser engine and digital handshakes to remove the browser address bar, your web-to-app wrapper must adapt to different operating systems and device configurations. This guide explains how to successfully prepare, package, and publish your PWA on the Amazon Appstore, Samsung Galaxy Store, and Huawei AppGallery.

Why Distribute Outside Google Play?

Diversifying your app distribution strategy reduces dependency on a single platform operator. Alternative app stores are particularly dominant on specific devices and in certain geographic markets where Google Services are unavailable or less popular. For instance, Amazon Fire tablets do not ship with Google Play, and modern Huawei devices rely entirely on Huawei AppGallery.

Publishing your TWA on multiple stores requires minimal additional development work. Because the core of your application resides on your web server, the same backend and frontend codebase serves all platforms. The main difference lies in how you package your application and verify ownership across different application stores.

Amazon Appstore for Android

The Amazon Appstore is the default marketplace for Amazon Fire tablets, Fire TV devices, and is also integrated into Windows 11 via the Windows Subsystem for Android. Publishing here gives you access to a dedicated ecosystem of tablet users and enterprise deployments.

Device Architecture and Web Engines

Amazon Fire tablets run Fire OS, a custom operating system built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). Instead of Google Chrome, Fire OS devices use Amazon Silk as the default browser engine. This introduces a technical challenge: standard Trusted Web Activities rely on a system-level browser that supports the Custom Tabs protocol, specifically Google Chrome.

If a Fire OS device does not have Google Chrome installed, a standard TWA wrapper may fall back to using a standard Chrome Custom Tab or an embedded WebView. To ensure a seamless, address-bar-free experience on Amazon devices, you must ensure your wrapper is configured to fall back gracefully. Many developers publishing to Amazon configure their wrapper to use an embedded WebView or verify that Fire OS browser environments can resolve the application launch without showing navigation UI.

Submission Requirements

Amazon accepts standard APK files. Unlike Google Play, which mandates the newer Android App Bundle (AAB) format for new apps, the Amazon Appstore still fully supports the upload of standalone, signed APKs. This makes the distribution pipeline straightforward if you have already generated a signed production APK.

Samsung Galaxy Store Integration

The Samsung Galaxy Store comes pre-installed on hundreds of millions of Samsung smartphones and tablets worldwide. Unlike Fire OS, Samsung devices run standard Android with Google Play Services and Google Chrome fully active. This makes the Samsung Galaxy Store an excellent, low-friction target for TWA deployment.

Leveraging Digital Asset Links

Because Samsung devices have Chrome or Samsung Internet installed, TWAs run exactly as they do when downloaded from Google Play. The browser verifies your domain ownership using your Digital Asset Links file hosted on your web server. No additional verification files are needed for the Galaxy Store, provided your assetlinks.json file is correctly configured at your domain root.

Packaging and Keystores

Samsung allows developers to submit both APK and AAB formats. You can use the same signed package and the same Android keystore that you generated for Google Play. Keeping the package name and signing key consistent across stores is highly recommended, as it allows users to transition between stores without encountering signature conflict errors.

Huawei AppGallery and Alternative Ecosystems

Modern Huawei devices operate on HMS (Huawei Mobile Services) and run EMUI or HarmonyOS. These devices do not include Google Chrome or Google Play Services. Instead, they rely on the Huawei Browser and the HMS Core runtime environment.

How TWAs Behave on HMS Devices

The Huawei Browser supports the Custom Tabs protocol and respects Digital Asset Links verification. When a TWA is launched on a Huawei device, the Huawei Browser processes the signature matching. If the SHA-256 fingerprint in your domain assetlinks.json matches the signature of the APK downloaded from AppGallery, the address bar is hidden successfully.

For optimal compatibility, ensure that your Digital Asset Links file contains all signing certificates used across your builds, including any specific certificates generated during the Huawei AppGallery signing process if you choose to let Huawei manage your app signatures.

Technical Differences and Package Formats

When targetting multiple stores, you must manage slight differences in submission formats, pricing, and registration requirements. The following table summarises the core characteristics of each platform:

How to Test Your App for Alternative Stores

Before submitting your TWA package to alternative marketplaces, you must verify that the app behaves correctly in environments that lack Google Play Services. Testing is crucial to prevent crashes and ensure that your web application handles different default browsers smoothly.

• Test on AOSP Emulators: Set up an Android Virtual Device (AVD) without Google APIs. Install your APK and verify that the app launches, handles network requests, and displays web pages correctly.
• Verify Browser Fallbacks: Ensure that your TWA wrapper includes robust fallback logic. If the device does not have a browser supporting Custom Tabs, the wrapper should gracefully load your PWA inside a secure WebView wrapper rather than failing to open.
• Double-check Package Names: Maintain a consistent package name across all stores. This prevents conflicts and ensures that deep links function uniformly, regardless of where the user installed the application.
• Examine Assetlinks Hosting: Ensure that your web server can handle the increased volume of requests for the Digital Asset Links file, as devices from different brands will query your domain root upon the first boot of the application.

By packaging your Progressive Web App as an Android package and distributing it across these secondary app stores, you maximise your digital footprint. The minimal overhead of maintaining multiple listings is quickly offset by the expanded reach to millions of active users outside the Google Play ecosystem.