With so many (old) apps disappearing from the playstore (probably because of EU compliance rules), I wonder why it’s so hard to pirate apks. Is there a source I’m missing?

For example, I’m currently looking for Last Horizon by noodlecake, it’s not available in the playstore. I can’t find it anywhere, I searched all the linked sites in the wiki. This happens everytime I’m looking for an app, it seems like only a very small amount of apps can be found

  • BearOfaTime@lemm.ee
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    6 hours ago

    Besides the websites like apkmirror/ApkPure, etc, I save APKs of apps I want to keep using an app like APK Extractor - this extractor will name the file with App Name, Package Name, and Version. Really helps.

    I have it extract to a folder on my phone that I keep synced to my server just for extracted APKs.

    One down side - an extracted apk may not install on a different phone or new OS, it’s a little trickier these days, downloaded APKs are more specific to phone and OS version now. I’d say maybe 1-2% of my extracted APKs don’t work on newer version of Android, and that’s with having APKs as far back as 2010, I have hundreds (my server says 1400, but there’s a little duplication.)