flutter_in_store_app_version_checker

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Description

A lightweight Flutter plugin to check whether your app (or any other app) has a newer version published on Google Play, ApkPure, or Apple App Store.

Minimum supported SDKs:

  • Flutter >=3.44.1
  • Dart >=3.12.1 <4.0.0

The plugin uses Flutter 3.44+ built-in Kotlin support on Android and retrieves installed app metadata through its own native method channel. It no longer depends on package_info_plus.

Add the dependency:

dependencies:
  flutter_in_store_app_version_checker: <current>

Supported platforms

Platform Stores
Android Google Play, ApkPure
iOS Apple App Store

Other platforms (Web, Windows, Linux, macOS, etc.) are not supported.

Supported Android stores

Android enum value Description
InStoreAppVersionCheckerAndroidStoreType.googlePlayStore Default Google Play flow
InStoreAppVersionCheckerAndroidStoreType.apkPure Alternative ApkPure scrape

API Overview

Main access point: InStoreAppVersionChecker (singleton: InStoreAppVersionChecker.instance) returning IInStoreAppVersionChecker implemented by InStoreAppVersionChecker.

Legacy factory-based API from 2.0.x has been removed. Use InStoreAppVersionChecker.instance or InStoreAppVersionChecker.instanceFor(...) together with InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams. InStoreAppVersionChecker.custom(...) is now deprecated and forwards to instanceFor(...).

Request parameters: InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams

Response object: InStoreAppVersionCheckerResponse

Internal installed-app metadata helper: AppMetadata

Key response fields:

  • isSuccess / isError
  • currentVersion
  • newVersion
  • canUpdate
  • appURL
  • errorMessage

Version comparison logic considers:

  • Pre-release tokens (numeric and mixed) after core version comparison.
  • Build metadata (+xyz) is ignored for equality/update decisions.
  • Whitespace trimmed; non-alphanumeric symbols stripped (see tests).
  • Mixed alphanumeric pre-release segments compared token-by-token with numeric-aware ordering.

Example

Simple check (Play Store HTML with fallback API)

import 'package:flutter_in_store_app_version_checker/flutter_in_store_app_version_checker.dart';

Future<void> check() async {
  const params = InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams(
    locale: 'en',
    // packageName:    'com.example.app', // optional override
    // currentVersion: '1.2.3',           // optional override
    // androidStore:   InStoreAppVersionCheckerAndroidStoreType.apkPure,
  );
  final res = await InStoreAppVersionChecker.instance.checkUpdate(params);
  if (res.isSuccess) {
    print('Current version: ${res.currentVersion}');
    print('New version    : ${res.newVersion}');
    print('App url        : ${res.appURL}');
    print('Can update     : ${res.canUpdate}');
  } else {
    print('Error          : ${res.errorMessage}');
  }
}

ApkPure

const params = InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams(
  locale: 'en',
  androidStore: InStoreAppVersionCheckerAndroidStoreType.apkPure,
);
final res = await InStoreAppVersionChecker.instance.checkUpdate(params);

iOS

const params = InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams(locale: 'en');
final res = await InStoreAppVersionChecker.instance.checkUpdate(params);

Custom HTTP client

final checker = InStoreAppVersionChecker.instanceFor(
  httpClient: customHTTPClient,
);
const params = InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams(locale: 'en');
final res = await checker.checkUpdate(params);

How package name and version are resolved

If packageName or currentVersion are not provided in InStoreAppVersionCheckerParams, the plugin resolves them from the installed app metadata on the host platform.

  • Android: package name and version from the plugin's native Android implementation
  • iOS: bundle identifier and CFBundleShortVersionString from the plugin's native iOS implementation

This behavior is covered by unit tests in test/unit/app_metadata_test.dart.

Version comparison notes

  • Release vs pre-release: a pure release is considered higher than a pre-release with the same core; therefore if current is release and new is pre-release -> treated as update (legacy-compatible).
  • Numeric pre-release tokens compared numerically; mixed/alphanumeric tokens compared lexicographically after numeric segments.
  • Trailing zero segment normalization: 1.2 equals 1.2.0 (no update).
  • Fully non-numeric current vs numeric new => update.
  • Fully non-numeric new vs numeric current => no update.
  • Build metadata (+build) ignored. See unit tests in test/unit for authoritative behavior.

Error handling

Types:

  • success
  • error (network failures, app not found, unsupported platform)

errorMessage is populated only for error responses. An error response may still indicate canUpdate == true if newVersion is greater.

Platform integration notes

  • Android example app is migrated to Flutter built-in Kotlin.
  • iOS Swift Package Manager support includes the required FlutterFramework dependency in Package.swift.
  • CocoaPods support remains available alongside Swift Package Manager.

Changelog

Refer to the Changelog to get all release notes.

Maintainers

Anton Ustinoff (ziqq)

License

MIT

Funding

If you want to support the development of our library, there are several ways you can do it:

Coverage

Libraries

flutter_in_store_app_version_checker