One of the games of the year is already on the starting line for its arrival on Android, but the launch of Fortnite will not be normal: the game cannot be installed via Google Play. A big statement of intent on the part of Epic Games that is causing some controversy in the industry.
We’ve been seeing a festival of rumors about Fortnite for a few weeks now. We are not fans of rumors, so we didn’t get on the clickbait train where so many platforms were fighting for a piece of the pastry. But now we already know a little more information about the most possible launch of Fortnite for Android. The date? Presumably the same day as the launch of the Samsung Galaxy Note 9, but for now we cannot put our hands on the fire for this statement.
They talked a thousand and one times about the launch of Fortnite for Android devices, but the last one can be a gift for users who presumably do not have a Samsung Galaxy Note 9: rumors point out that this release will be temporarily exclusive for the owners of this device. Information that is escalating to rumors that Fortnite Mobile will be exclusive to the Samsung Galaxy family for four months. We have to wait for August 9, the date of presentation of the Samsung Galaxy Note 9, so that we can glimpse once and for all how much is true in these statements.
But although Fortnite’s temporary exclusivity may be bad news for the rest of Android users, even more relevant is the announcement that this work will not go through Google Play. A news that was advanced by XDA and that became reality to everyone’s surprise. Epic decided to tap Google because don’t want to pay 30% of their earnings to the Mountain View company, as Epic CEO Tim Sweeney declared in The Verge. He also said that another reason why Fortnite is not downloaded via Google Play is because they want to «have a more direct relationship with their customers» without intermediaries in between.
This future release is creating some uncertainty and some media have already made alarmist articles about it. So we wanted to clarify a couple of questions about the security of APK files and the use of sources other than Google Play to install applications on Android.
Downloading APK from trusted sources is safe
It’s kind of weird for us to have to answer these kinds of questions, especially when we’ve been the alternative to Google Play for a long time, but circumstances require it: Downloading APKs from alternative sources to Google Market is reliable. It’s just having a little common sense and choosing credible APK distribution platforms. The same as with downloading files on Windows. It would be a mistake to think that everything that is not Google Play is not reliable, since we have seen several cases where downloading through Google Play itself ended up in apps that infect our devices with malware. That’s why we don’t understand why so much fuss about Fortnite for Android not going to Google Play.
The question is to download APKs from trusted sites, such as APKMirror, APKPure or right here by Uptodown itself. All files that are downloaded via Uptodown previously went through the Virustotal service, where more than 50 antivirus scan each file in detail. That’s why downloading APKs from our website is completely safe for the user. And we are convinced that Epic will take this as seriously as we do.
Android is not Google Play
As strange as this statement may sound initially, Android is not an operating system that forces users to use Google Play “yes or yes”. It may be that the West has become accustomed to the fact that every Android device comes with the Google suite, but in Asia the conversation is different. That is why there are alternative marketplaces how we can be ourselves: at Uptodown we want every Android user to be able to enjoy a free system that adapts to their needs, no matter where on the planet they live or the device they have at hand.
To question the importance of Google Play would be very stupid of us, since is a fundamental platform for the development and exposure of the Android ecosystem. But the same is true of other successful platforms like Steam for the PC world. Although they are tremendously important places, it does not magically make them the only places to access to download things. There is a whole world of possibilities outside of them, as the Fortnite release will demonstrate and how it has been doing our site for a long time. Android was born with the idea of ​​being an open platform, something that apparently does not enter the minds of many people.
What devices are compatible with Fortnite?
We want to end with the list of mobile devices that are supposed to be compatible with Fortnite for Android. We knew that Fortnite would require very powerful devices, but it’s at least strange that we don’t see popular brands like Xiaomi on the list. According to XDA-Developers, the minimum specifications of this list are a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430, MediaTek MT6737, Exynos 7870 or HiSilicon Kirin 655 CPU, an Adreno 505 or Mali-T720 GPU and 3GB of RAM. So we hope that many of us will be able to play Fortnite if we meet these specifications, even if the devices are not listed below.
- Google Pixel 2
- Google Pixel 2 XL
- Huawei Mate 10
- Huawei Mate 10 Lite
- Huawei Mate 10 Pro
- Huawei P10
- Huawei P10 Plus
- Huawei P10 Lite
- Huawei P9
- Huawei P9 Lite
- Huawei P8 Lite (2017)
- LG G6
- LG V30
- LG V30 +
- Motorola Moto E4 Plus
- Motorola Moto G5
- Motorola Moto G5 Plus
- Motorola Moto G5s
- Motorola Moto Z2 Play
- Nokia 6
- Razer Phone
- Samsung Galaxy A5 (2017)
- Samsung Galaxy A7 (2017)
- Samsung Galaxy J7 Prime (2017)
- Samsung Galaxy J7 Pro (2017)
- Samsung Galaxy Note 8
- Samsung Galaxy On7 (2016)
- Samsung Galaxy S9
- Samsung Galaxy S9 +
- Samsung Galaxy S7
- Samsung Galaxy S7 edge
- Samsung Galaxy S8
- Samsung Galaxy S8 +
- Sony Xperia XA1
- Sony Xperia XA1 Ultra
- Sony Xperia XA1 Plus
- Sony Xperia XZ
- Sony Xperia XZs
- Sony Xperia XZ1
