Google Play reviews now take longer than a week, XMPP developer warns

The lead developer of the XMPP messaging app Conversations has called Google Play review times unacceptable, saying the process now regularly takes longer than a week even for apps that have been around for more than a decade.

What the developer wrote

Daniel Gultsch, project lead of the Conversations instant-messaging client, published the complaint on 16 September. He wrote that he understands the review pipeline is clogged with AI slop - his description - but argued Google needs to prioritize Android apps that have existed for 12 years or more and publish updates only about once a month.

The screenshot behind the complaint

Attached to the post is an image of the Google Play Console showing that the Conversations update was submitted on 9 September and, a week later on the day of posting, was still pending review. The public post had drawn 26 boosts, 36 favourites and nine replies.

Android Auto looks like the bottleneck

Several developers who answered singled out Android Auto support as the cause of the long waits. One wrote that reviews for their app used to take 48 to 72 hours at most, and two to eight hours before Android Auto was added, but now stretch to two or three weeks, with support requests answered by boilerplate. That developer said they dropped Android Auto and told users to install the app from other sources; the next review, they said, took only a couple of hours.

An F-Droid maintainer who replied questioned why a review would take more than an hour at all, assuming most of the process is automated, and suggested that Google may simply prioritize apps that use its advertising and tracking services. Other replies were blunter, arguing that software which sends no telemetry gets pushed to the back of the queue.

Alternative distribution

Part of the thread moved to distribution beyond Google Play. One reply suggested F-Droid, and another user pointed out that Conversations is already published there while Gultsch is paid for copies installed through Google Play, so leaving the store would cost him revenue. Gultsch answered one critical reply by saying he agrees with the point and is working on it.