Monitor App Store Ratings & Compare with Competitors

Reviews and ratings show you how well your app is perceived over time. For example, your customers’ perceptions of your app may change after a feature update; this will directly impact your reviews and ratings. Thanks to AppTweak’s Reviews & Ratings section, you can:

• Monitor any change in your reviews and ratings
• Benchmark your app with its competitors
• Monitor your ratings over time and across countries (Worldwide view)

Analyze your app store ratings over time

Our new Ratings section will display how your ratings evolve over time. It is really important to analyze trends in your ratings to determine whether your app is gaining or losing popularity on the app stores.

In the My Ratings tab, you will first find a depiction of your current app ratings on the store right now. To understand whether your average rating is good enough, we also provide the average rating of the top apps in your category in 2020. This benchmark will tell you whether the top apps in this category typically have a higher or lower average rating.

Looking at the Among Us game (iOS, US), we see that its average rating is lower than for the top apps in the Games category.

If you want to increase your app’s average rating but don’t know how to identify the efforts needed, you can try our “Assess your app” feature.

In this example, to reach the same average rating as the top apps in its category, Among Us will need to receive 22,738 more daily 5-star ratings for one month.

When you look at the graph section, you will see that AppTweak has divided this part into 3 main graphs. The first shows you the number of ratings gained per day/week/month (you can change this option on each graph). You will also see the evolution of average ratings over time, showing you how ratings gained have impacted your overall rating.

In the example below, the game Among Us received a lot of negative ratings at the end of March and the beginning of April 2021. This resulted in a decrease in its average rating, going from 4.48 to 4.21.

Below the graph, you will find a summary table that displays the number of new ratings received over the date range selected and how this has evolved compared to the previous equivalent period. For instance, the screenshot above shows us that, over 6 months, the number of 1-star ratings gained increased by 43% and the number of 5-star ratings gained decreased by 72%. Compared to the 6-month period prior, this app received 72% fewer 5-star ratings.

The second graph in this section will show you an aggregated view of the total ratings. This will help you understand how your overall ratings evolve over time.

The summary table below this graph is also very helpful as it shows the number of ratings at the beginning of the period compared to the number of ratings at the end of the period. As a result, you can monitor how your ratings have performed over a specific date range.

In the last graph of My Ratings tab, you will find the option “Change in average rating.” The goal of this graph is to quickly pinpoint the day/week/month in which your app lost/gained the most average ratings. For instance, looking at the monthly view for Among Us, we clearly see that March and April were the game’s worst months. This suggests that the game received a lot of negative ratings during these few months, which could be due to a bad marketing strategy, a new update, lots of bugs, etc. Thanks to AppTweak, we are able to dig deeper to identify the cause of such a decrease.

Compare your performance with competitors

Once you have analyzed your app store ratings, you can spy on your competitors (or other apps from the same publisher) to see how well they perform compared to your app.

The first section shows your app’s current ratings. The competitor view shows you the current star spread and average rating of all your competitors. In the case of Among Us, we clearly see that the competitors selected have a more positive star spread. In addition, the game has the lowest average rating compared to the group of games selected.

Since the default view will show the spread in percentage, these results can be skewed if some apps only have a few ratings. That’s why, “Ratings (total)” shows the total number of ratings per app. In this case, Among Us has the lowest average rating and holds the 3rd place position in total ratings.

In the graph, you will be able to see either the average rating or the total ratings per app over time.

Compared to its competitors, Among Us is clearly lagging behind in terms of average rating. However, this wasn’t always the case. The graph below shows us that the game was almost at the same level as its competitors before March.

In the “Total ratings” tab, the summary table explains how many new ratings each game received. Above all, it shows the evolution of the star spread. In the case of Among Us, it makes sense for us to see more 1-star ratings at the end of the period.

Analyze, monitor, & compare your app ratings across countries

Gaining a deeper understanding of your users’ opinions in one country is valuable, but doing this for each country your app is available in can be complicated. Want to quickly see in one glance where your app is receiving the best (and worst) ratings? Use our worldwide view by clicking on the “worldwide option” in the country drop-down in the app header (Enterprise plans only).

The Worldwide view allows you to view your app’s average and total ratings across countries. Filters, global KPIs, and a table view help you easily pinpoint the countries in which your app excels in the eyes of users, and those that need a little more attention.

You can now use the Worldwide view on AppTweak to monitor your analytics worldwide!

Quickly pinpoint where your app has the best/worst ratings

Google Classroom’s current rating in India (Google Play)

In the aforementioned example, we take a look at ratings for the Google Classroom app on Google Play, India. If we stopped our analysis here, we might see that the app’s rating is not so bad (above 4) and move on to the next country.

Google Classroom’s worldwide ratings (Google Play).

However, when we check the Worldwide view (shown above), we’re able to quickly pinpoint the countries that might need a little more attention. For example, while the app has a rating above 4 in India, it seems to be struggling in other countries, such as Spain (average rating of 1.62).

Table view of Google Classroom’s worldwide ratings (Google Play)

Thanks to the table view below the map, we can also identify 4 other countries in which the app has a below-average rating of 3, which could be quite concerning. A more in-depth look also shows us that the app’s low average rating in most countries is due to a high proportion of 1-star ratings, indicating a poor user perception of the app.

Prioritize the countries with the highest number of ratings

Even if you have a very low average rating in some countries, you should prioritize your app in its largest markets. To do so, have a look at the total ratings view.

Candy Crush’s worldwide ratings (iOS)

For example, we see above that Candy Crush Saga’s biggest markets are North America, India, Brazil, the UK, and France. There are a lot of people using and rating the app in these countries. As a result, Candy Crush should definitely keep an eye on their ratings here.

Table view of Candy Crush’s worldwide ratings (iOS).

In our table view (sorted by average rating, in descending order), we notice that Candy Crush gets its highest average ratings in different countries from where it gets the most ratings (in total). We encourage app developers to prioritize their biggest countries by considering these factors to assess where to focus their efforts (in terms of market opportunities). Doing this can also help you improve your review management process so you know in which countries you should be replying to more reviews and, hopefully, convincing users to edit their ratings.

Find out how and why to reply to reviews on the App Store & Google Play

Notice that you can also click the expand button next to each country to get a more detailed analysis of the situation in that specific market.

Conclusion

With AppTweak’s Ratings section, you can now access many new insights:

• Use our new KPIs to better understand trends in your app ratings
• Check out the average rating of your benchmarks
• Pinpoint the best and worst day/week/month for ratings
• Use the competitor comparison view to compare your app with competitors
• Analyze, monitor, and compare your app ratings across countries

Learn more about our improved reviews & ratings insights with these blogs about monitoring your app reviews and user opinions over time.