Windows 11 Android app support is back in China, but why?

Microsoft recently deprecated WSA and they didn’t say why. We can only assume that the Amazon Appstore downloads for Windows 11 were not on par with the predicted outcome. Also, actually getting to run the Android apps on your PC was not so simple as advertised. Ultimately, the lack of Google support probably decided Windows Subsystem’s for Android faith.

Well, that’s why it’s very confusing that the Microsoft Chinese website announced (translated) a partnership with the Tencent company to download and run mobile games right from the Microsoft Store.

Why is Microsoft allowing WSA in China?

Before clarifying this move, here’s how Lin Songtao, vice president of Tencent, describes the fruition of this partnership in the press announcement:

The PC side has a huge user base. We hope to work with Microsoft Store and Intel through the PC version of Yongyongbao to provide technology, traffic and commercialization support for mobile developers on cross-terminal integration, and jointly promote the PC application ecosystem. prosperous development and provide users with a better cross-terminal experience.

Lin Songtao, vice president of Tencent

Long story short, China is a huge market, and Tencent has a large user base and a lot of apps to justify this exception. And, if you’re looking for more reasons, the Chinese probably brought up sheer numbers to the meeting with Microsoft, also suggested in the press release excerpt from Microsoft:

According to reports, the scale of new additions to some games currently on the PC version of Yongyongbao has increased by 100% compared with the single mobile version. The PC scenario payment of some games accounts for more than 40% of the market turnover. The next-day retention of new games is 1.9 times that of the market.

Well, there you have it. While Microsoft didn’t quite match Google and their store, China laid out a red carpet for the Redmond giant. So, will we see a comeback for WSA in other parts of the world? I would clearly say that it’s not feasible without the big input from a large Android app base such as the one from Google Play.

We’ve learned about this from Neowin. Were you using WSA on Windows 11? Let’s talk about this story in the comments below.