TL,DR; Email builds are coming to Android. This will make our platform more stable and make installation easier and faster for you.
What:
We’re making the build and download process more consistent across the platform
When:
Subject to testing, we’re hoping to have this out in the coming days.
Why:
Since launching in 2018, we’ve had one system for downloading iOS apps and another for Android apps. From the beginning iOS users have had the ability to email apps to themselves. This means that installation is really easy, because all you have to do is open the email on your phone and click “install”.
The current system for Android is quite different. Builds happen silently and goes directly to your Downloads folder. After this you still have to transfer the .apk file to your device which slows down the process for you. These builds also happen “silently”, meaning that you don’t get any feedback about how long it will take. While the process is usually quite speedy, at peak times some users are experiencing longer wait times and in a lot of cases trying to download repeatedly before the first build has even completed. Additionally, in the rare case of an error with the build, the current system has no way of notifying the user about this.
The new Android download system will now be very similar to iOS downloads.
- You will be emailed a download link to your app,
- We’ll give you an estimate of how long it will take and
- If there are any issues with your project we’ll send you an email letting you know what you need to do to fix it.
The main benefit to this system is that it is something we can scale and continue to improve as Thunkable grows and demand increases.