Amazon Appstore on Windows

Amazon and Microsoft are bringing the Amazon Appstore to Windows 11. Windows 11 customers can install the Amazon Appstore client through the Microsoft Store. After installed, Windows 11 customers can view and install Android apps present in the Amazon Appstore catalog.

Microsoft uses an Android Open Source Project (AOSP) version of Android for their Windows Subsystem for Android™ (WSA). Microsoft is staying current with the security updates from AOSP, and leverages features such as multi-display and memory optimization. As of January 2023, Windows Subsystem for Android™ is based on Android 13. For the latest feature updates, see Microsoft’s Release Notes for Windows Subsystem for Android™ .

Add keyboard and mouse support

How your customers interact with your app on a Windows device could be different from how they would interact with your app on the Fire devices and Android devices that you might usually design for. To ensure your customers have a smooth experience with your app on Windows, follow the guidance provided on this and related pages.

If you designed your app for a touchscreen device, it might not support a keyboard or a mouse. A Windows computer might not have a touchscreen, so it’s important to provide compatible input support for customers using your app on Windows.

To get started, review the Input controls topic in the Windows compatibility guide.

Window management and resizing

Android apps run on Windows 11 can be freely resized or snapped using Windows actions or gestures. Your app should handle these actions gracefully. For more information on window management, see Window management and resizing in the Windows compatibility guide.

Best practices

To make your Android app compatible with Windows, follow these general best practices.

Support x86 ABI architecture. Most Windows devices use either Intel or AMD processors, which are x86-based. Windows Subsystem for Android uses Intel Bridge Technology to emulate Arm® applications on x86-based processors. The emulation layer induces a performance overhead, so for optimal performance, submit your application for both the x86-64 and Arm64 architectures. For details on how to support x86 ABI architecture, see the Android developer guide to Include x86 ABI architecture .

Use scoped storage for file system access. If your app needs access to device storage, you must enable scoped storage. Follow the Android developer documentation on Android storage use cases and best practices . If you target Android 11 and above devices, you might already support scoped storage.

Verify the compatibility of your ad SDK with Windows devices. Many ad SDKs are incompatible with Windows Subsystem for Android. To disable incompatible ad SDKs, see Disable unsupported ad SDKs in the Windows compatibility guide.

Disable unsupported hardware features. Certain hardware features that are available on a mobile device, such as Bluetooth and Wi-Fi management, are unavailable to your app when run on Windows Subsystem for Android. For a list of unsupported features, see the Unsupported feature tables in the Windows compatibility guide. To handle unsupported features, see Handle unsupported features in the Windows compatibility guide.

For compatibility guidelines on more topics, see Windows Compatibility Guide.

Test your app on Windows

Testing your app on Windows might reveal issues that you don’t encounter on mobile devices. To get started with testing your app on Windows, follow Microsoft’s Test and debug  guide. If you need help solving a specific issue, try looking it up in the Troubleshooting Index for Windows.

You can also use the Appstore’s Live App Testing (LAT) to test your app. Before you get started with LAT, the Amazon Appstore must enable your app to target Windows devices. To do this, Contact the Appstore and include your App ID
in the request. Next, follow the steps in Get Started with Live App Testing.

Related resources

For more information on how to get your app ready for Windows, see the following pages.

Last updated: Apr 11, 2023