Is it possible to submit an update for an app on the AppStore without losing reviews?

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+2 Q:

Is it possible to submit an update for an app on the AppStore without losing reviews?

Whenever I submit an update for me app, the number of reviews visible for it drops to 0. If the customer bothers to click through they can see the previous versions' reviews...

But the damage has been done. Since the app has 0 stars, I see a significant drop in sales. It takes the app a good week of earning new reviews to restore sales.

I usually version the app as 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 etc.

Is there something I can do during the update process to prevent losing reviews like this?

+1 A:

Nope you cannot do this. Users will always see the number of ratings for the current version and not the total for all versions.

texmex5 2010-05-05 16:01:48

Ugh, what a disincentive! Every time I update the app I lose sales? Geeze...

Frank Krueger 2010-05-05 16:08:21

Want to know another bad thing? I am actually from Estonia, where "a very popular app" will have ~3 reviews in the AppStore, meaning I have no idea if an app is good or bad before I buy it. OK, I actually will go and look from US store, but you get the idea … But if people are interested enough they will check out the ratings for the previous versions :-) Atleast I do it :)

texmex5 2010-05-05 16:31:45

+1 A:

You are not actually losing reviews. iTunes only shows reviews for the current version (when enough reviews are available). On the app page the overall is still listed. There is no way to override this behavior, so make your updates infrequent.

Jason Webb 2010-05-05 16:14:03

I understand the distinction thanks. **Effectively** I lose the reviews due to their poor UI.

Frank Krueger 2010-05-05 17:46:37

But I am not sure if it would be in the users intrest to change the UI. When I buy an app I will always get the last version and I am actually very interested how that specific version works and would want to be blinded with thousands of reviews saying great app when the thruth is that the latest version has smaller functionality or worse performance. Same goes with devs. the review grouping by version game after developers wanted to get rid of bad reviews that came with problems in previous versions that have already been fixed in the newer ones.

texmex5 2010-05-06 06:44:33

ansaurus

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Is it possible to submit an update for an app on the AppStore without losing reviews?

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