Overview
The Rating Analysis allows you to track your app ratings (stars) dynamics for different apps, countries, and timeframes. In this article, you’ll learn about the types of ratings available on this page, how they differ by store, and what other information is available in this section.
Types of Ratings
We show two different types of ratings in the Rating Analysis:
- Incremental
- Total (cumulative)
The Incremental tab provides detailed information on how your app ratings changed during a specific timeframe. To show you the breakdown of changes, we collect the overall (total) app ratings day by day and calculate the difference between dates.
The Total (cumulative) tab shows you the sum of your app’s overall (total) ratings on specified dates.
Keep reading to learn how we collect this data and how to get access to it.
Data Collection
The App Store
For iOS and macOS apps, we collect all rating data from public sources (the app pages are shown to end-users on the App Store of each country).
We start collecting ratings at the backend as soon as the app is added to the AppFollow platform.
- If you’re the first to add a specific app to AppFollow, you’ll see rating data starting from the day when you added the app.
- If the app was added to AppFollow at some point in the past, you’ll see historical ratings starting from that day.
To analyze your app’s downloads and conversion rates, configure the full-access integration with App Store Connect. This allows us to show the data in the Star Distribution section of the Rating Analysis.
Google Play Store
Google Play ratings are collected from different data sources (public and private). To learn more, check out our article: Google Play: Public and Private Ratings.
For Google Play apps, we collect country-specific ratings from public sources (the app pages shown to end-users in the Google Play Store of each country).
Google Play recalculates (removes and/or adds) ratings (stars) on a regular basis. You may see spikes, gaps, or negative values on the chart. Learn more in the Star Distribution section of this article.
We start collecting ratings at the backend as soon as the app is added to the AppFollow platform.
- If you’re the first to add a specific app to AppFollow, you’ll see rating data starting from the day when you added the app.
- If the app was added to AppFollow at some point in the past, you’ll see historical ratings starting from that day.
To analyze worldwide ratings, configure the Ratings Integration with Google Play Console. This allows us to collect worldwide rating data from your GP Console (country-specific ratings are still collected from public app pages shown to end-users on the Google Play Store of each country). The integration also provides access to:
- Country and version breakdown graphs.
- Additional information about your app’s downloads and conversion rate.
Worldwide ratings are processed by Google Play with a delay of 3 days. For example, on September 10th you’ll be able to see ratings for September 7th.
Summary
In the summary section, you’ll find an overview of the app’s rating stats.
Incremental Ratings
If you’re looking at the incremental tab, we show data for the entire timeframe you selected in the page’s filter settings. For example, if you choose September 1st – September 7th, you’ll see the number and average of ratings left from September 1st to September 7th.
- New Ratings – the number of ratings given during the timeframe selected in the filters section and the difference in the number of ratings compared to the previous period.
- Average new rating – the average of the ratings given during the timeframe selected in the filters section. This is related only to positive new ratings for the selected period (if "show negative values" is toggled, the average will remain the same).
- Star breakdown – the distribution of ratings during the selected timeframe, displayed as a percentage and absolute value. This section breaks down ratings by stars so that you can evaluate the portion of 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1-star ratings.
Total Ratings
If you’re looking at the Total (cumulative) tab, we show the overall ratings for the last date of the timeframe you selected in the page’s filter sections. For example, if you set the date filter from September 1st to September 7th, we'll show you the overall rating as it appeared in the store on September 7th.
- Ratings over time – the total number of ratings your app received from the app’s launch to the end of the selected timeframe.
- Average rating – the app’s total average rating at the end of the selected timeframe.
- Overall star breakdown – the distribution of total ratings for the selected timeframe, displayed as a percentage and absolute value. This section breaks down ratings by stars so that you can evaluate the portion of 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1-star ratings.
For each app, you can follow the link to the public app page in Google Play to cross-check the data displayed, which accurately reflects what end-users see for the selected country:
Star Distribution
Incremental Ratings
The incremental star distribution graph shows you the number and star count of ratings an app received on a specific day or week. For every date on the chart, you see the breakdown of ratings given on that exact date. The chart also provides the average and trend lines which show the changes to the app’s ratings:
- The average rating line shows the dynamic of the average daily rating changes.
- The trend shows a tendency for the average rating changes. It shows whether the average daily rating increases or decreases over a period of time.
You'll see this default view for worldwide and country-specific App Store ratings, and for worldwide Google Play ratings. We go over country-specific Google Play ratings in the next paragraph.
If you're looking at country-specific data for an Android app you will see the daily difference between the ratings that Google shows on the app's public page – this is the page that end-users see when they go to download your app. This view may show negative ratings.
Country-specific and worldwide ratings will not add up. This is because the data is taken from different sources: country-specific ratings are from the public app page, and the worldwide rating is from the developer console. Google does not match these ratings, and we reflect the exact ratings Google Play provides. More details here: Google Play: Public and Private Ratings.
Google recalculates and deletes ratings regularly. This means that the rating distribution today may be very different from what it looked like yesterday. For example, your app may have had 100 5-star ratings yesterday, but today it will have only 80. We will show you this difference, and as a result, you will see a negative number of 5-star ratings on the chart.
Turn the "Show negative values" toggle to see negative numbers on the chart.
The Breakdown bar presents the following information:
- Received — the sum of all positive values (ratings added by Google Play)
- Removed — the sum of all negative values (ratings removed by Google Play)
Worldwide incremental ratings are unavailable without a Google Play integration. This is because public app pages are country-specific. If you want to see worldwide stats, please set up a Google Play Ratings Integration.
Total Ratings
The total star distribution graph shows you the distribution of total ratings on the given date. This means that you’ll see what the app’s total (sum) rating was on a specific date or week, as well as the breakdown of the different numbers of stars the app had on that date.
In addition to the rating distribution, you can enable average and trend lines to get an overview of the changes to the app’s ratings on the chart:
- The average rating line shows the dynamic of the average total rating changes based on the public data.
- The trend shows a tendency for the average total rating changes. It shows whether the average total rating had an upward or downward movement over time.
Due to changes on Google Play's side, the Worldwide Total rating is no longer available. You can still filter Total rating data for specific countries. More information on this: Google Play Ratings: Public & Private Data.
Country and Version Breakdowns
Breakdowns are available for all iOS apps, and for Android apps with an active Google Play ASO integration. Please refer to the Data Collection section of this article to learn more.
The details you see for iOS and Android apps will be slightly different:
- iOS app stats include the distribution of ratings:
- Android app stats show you the rating count, the average rating for a country or version, as well as the share of ratings this country or version has.
The Country and Version breakdown data for Android app is provided by the Google Play Console.
Country Breakdown
In this breakdown, you’ll see information about the top 4 countries where your app has the most ratings, and all other countries are grouped under “Others.”
The data in this section depends on your workspace country settings. If your workspace is set to a specific country, you’ll only see data for that country.
If you have a specific country selected in the page’s filter settings, we’ll display the stats only for the chosen country. All other locations will be grouped under “Others.”
Version Breakdown
The version breakdown shows the breakdown of ratings for the last 4 versions of your app. Previous versions are grouped under “Others.” If you select a specific country in the page’s filters, we’ll show you only the stats for that country.