Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR Play Store reviews can be a useful resource for learning about apps, but they lack a search tool.
You can currently filter reviews by score, date, or even specific topics, but you can’t add new topics yourself.
It’s not yet functional, but some new code strings in the Play Store app suggest that Google’s working on a review search tool.
Reviews have to be one of the most frustrating-to-navigate components of life online — one that we nonetheless find ourselves returning to time and time again. When you don’t know exactly what the best option for you is just yet, a good user review can really be illuminating. But finding that good one can sometimes require trudging through screens of low-quality submissions, AI slop, and even the work of paid shills. If you’re looking for some help finding the one review that really speaks to your needs, the Google Play Store appears to be working on a tool that might be right up your alley.
Let’s say you’ve found an app on the Play Store that sounds promising, but you’re not yet sure it’s able to do exactly what you need it to. Looking at user reviews for someone else writing about the same use case you have in mind could be a prefect way to address that. But right now, Google doesn’t offer an easy way to search through those; you can sort by date or perceived relevancy, or filter reviews by those mentioning specific topics, but there’s no way to arbitrarily search for whatever topic you want.
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Looking at version 48.7.17-31 of the Google Play Store for Android, we’ve spotted what feels like early work towards making reviews searchable:
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