How I Built Apps With Over 2 Million Downloads — Part 1 (Choosing An Idea)

Hi everyone, my name’s Alex, and I have been writing Android apps and publishing them under my very aptly named RandomAppsInc Google Play handle since 2013. I have been working full-time as a software engineer since I graduated from college, so all of my apps were hacked together in my spare time as side projects. Despite that, they have accumulated over 2 million downloads and 20 thousand ratings, the vast majority of which are 5 stars.

Some of my published Android apps from the Google Play Developer Console

Over these past 6 years and 25+ published apps, I have learned quite a lot about what it takes to build successful products. In this 4-part article series, I will break down what I’ve learned, split up by sub-topics within each part. Even though all of my apps were side projects and were Android apps specifically, I feel like a lot of what’s in these articles can be applied to product development in general. So even if you aren’t an Android developer, I recommend sticking around if you just like building stuff. To keep this information as accessible as possible, I will always start off with the more general, high-level advice and end with the Android-specific information. Anyways, the content will be split up as follows:

1. Choosing Ideas: This covers how you answer the question, “What product should I build?”.
2. Building The Product: Now…