Google has bumped up the size of apps that developers can create for Android – with the total package size raised from 50MB to 4GB.
Although Google will still encourage developers to keep app file sizes down, some apps would benefit from being able to call on larger files to support performance.
“Every megabyte you add makes it harder for your users to download and get started,” said Google’s Tim Bray in an Android blog post.
“However, some types of apps, like high-quality 3D interactive games, require more local resources. So today, we’re expanding the Android app size limit to 4GB.”
Although the APK file will remain limited to 50MB, applications will be able to dip into two expansion files, each one up to 2GB and in any format.
Google said it would host the files to save developers the “hassle and cost of file serving”, and said developers should carefully consider how they used the expanded capability.
“While you can use the two expansion files any way you wish, we recommend that one serve as the initial download and be rarely if ever updated,” Bray said. “The second can be smaller and serve as a ‘patch carrier’, getting versioned with each major release.”
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