I've always been amazed by how unusable the play store was. I'd actually like to browse apps sometimes, but it always was choke full of useless ads pushing the worst apps possible. I only go there once every blue moon when I exactly know what I want, download it and get out of there.

It's not surprising, that's how their search engine has worked forever. But yeah, icky is a good word for it.

Play Store search is horrible. You can literally search for the exact name of the app you want and NOT have it anywhere in the results.

makes me want to increase the F-Droid alternatives that I use

Just go this way, and if you're fed up with the Play Store switch to Aurora Store: same apps, no ads.

Google rocketed past 'icky' long ago, around the time they awkwardly removed 'don't be evil' from their motto.

Ads in any kind of app store search should SUPER NOT BE ALLOWED. Microsoft does it, Google does it, even the Apple app store has it. I don't want my grandma to be looking for her bank app and download Fast Cash Transfer Free 2024 Edition instead

Just like Google Search results. I don't even really notice those anymore because my brain ignores them automatically.

I've clicked the "install" button on the ad by accident, more than once. The ad precedes an exact match, super dark pattern.

Google is an ad company, what do you expect.

You can use the Aurora Store, it's basically the Google Play store but without the annoying ads.

TBH, Google itself is kinda "icky" and has been for awhile.

Yeah I think it's pretty wack. If I search doordash then Uber eats will be the first result or if I search Uber eats then doordash will be the first result lol the ads are getting so extreme it pretty much evens out in the end and it's all completely pointless aside from making everything more annoying for the user

The layout is very confusing. It makes it look like Excel is also an ad.

I'm glad I basically never use the play store.

Almost all ads are icky

It's about as icky as looking at my bank account and my bank highlighting a transfer to an investment house and suggesting its' own in the same line.

This has always been the case in Google search (you know the search engine Google started with as a company). Drove me crazy when I would see an old person click the AD link instead of the actual search result

The digital zeitgeist is a fuckin dystopia.

Dude they'd place adds directly in your medula spine fluid orif somethin if they could.

Yes, happens all the time.

Some sort of malware will always pop up before the app you're looking for.

I literally just prioritise f droid, and a Google App search tool I found a bit ago that let's you sort such to show no Inapp etc

https://playsearch.kaki87.net/

Where it came from: https://www.reddit.com/r/googleplay/comments/9lesfd/my_advanced_google_play_search_engine_webapp/

So icky.😱

F-droid's your friend

Use the Aurora Store!

It's gross and deceptive. I report them every time.

Can't think of a singular time that type of stuff hasn't been icky and absolutely disgusting.

If you're against this kind of behavior, you should advocate that Android/iOS are platforms and not products, so that centralized app stores are a medium for developers and not a proprietary product under one company.

Probably easier to tell if there were images. Why are they missing

It clearly says sponsored, so not really no.

Yes it is gross, it Apple does the same thing in their app store. So it is nothing that can be avoided with using the major players.

I don't mind it so much as it makes it hard to find the actual application I'm looking for most of the time. Your case here is a perfect example of this.

Google has done crappy "suggested results" for so many years now that I automatically ignore the top results from any Google search, so all this does is make it harder to find things :-(

Aurora Store works like a charm without ads or tracking.

Play Store doing this since September, at least in my region (SE Asia). If you disabled personalized ads on your Google Account, Play Store homepage displays ads that are frequently installed from your country/state.