baijum/play-store-promote-public

Play Store Promote Public

Promote a release to open testing or production using the Gradle Play Publisher (GPP) plugin.

Prerequisites

• Release already uploaded to internal testing (via play-store-upload or android-release)
• Service account key at app/play-service-account.json
• Service account has "Release to testing tracks" and "Release apps to production" permissions in Play Console

Workflow

Step 1: Choose the target track and rollout strategy

Ask the user which track to promote to:

| Track | Description | Risk level | |-------|-------------|------------| | Open testing | Available to anyone who opts in via Play Store | Medium | | Production (staged) | Gradual rollout to a percentage of users | Low | | Production (full) | Immediate rollout to all users | High |

For production, recommend staged rollout starting at 20% unless the user requests full rollout.

Step 2: Promote the release

Promote to open testing:

./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track internal --promote-track beta --release-status completed

Staged rollout to production (recommended):

./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track internal --promote-track production --release-status inProgress --user-fraction 0.2

Full rollout to production:

./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track internal --promote-track production --release-status completed

• Use block_until_ms: 60000 (promotion typically takes 10-30s).
• --release-status inProgress with --user-fraction enables staged rollout.
• --release-status completed makes the release available to all users immediately.

Step 3: Increase staged rollout (if applicable)

If using staged rollout, the user may later ask to increase the percentage or complete the rollout:

Increase rollout percentage:

./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track production --promote-track production --release-status inProgress --user-fraction <fraction>

Common rollout stages: 0.2 → 0.5 → 1.0

Complete the rollout (100%):

./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track production --promote-track production --release-status completed

Step 4: Report result

After a successful promotion, provide:

• Confirmation of the source track and destination track
• Rollout percentage (if staged)
• Link to Play Console: https://play.google.com/console/developers/apps/com.baijum.ukufretboard/tracks

Quick Reference

| Task | Command | |------|---------| | Open testing | ./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track internal --promote-track beta --release-status completed | | Production staged 20% | ./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track internal --promote-track production --release-status inProgress --user-fraction 0.2 | | Production staged 50% | ./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track production --promote-track production --release-status inProgress --user-fraction 0.5 | | Production full rollout | ./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track internal --promote-track production --release-status completed | | Complete staged rollout | ./gradlew promoteReleaseArtifact --from-track production --promote-track production --release-status completed |

Troubleshooting

• "No release found in track": Ensure a release exists in the source track. Upload to internal testing first with ./gradlew publishReleaseBundle.
• "Track not found": Open testing is beta in GPP. Production is production.
• "Unauthorized" or 403: The service account needs "Release apps to production" permission in Play Console for production promotions.
• "Cannot reduce user fraction": Staged rollouts can only increase the fraction or complete. To roll back, halt the rollout in Play Console.
• Staged rollout not progressing: Monitor crash rate and ANR rate in Play Console before increasing the rollout percentage.