I couldn’t find a clear answer anywhere, so I hope nobody minds this thread.
What is the exact difference between building to windows phone or building to windows store?
Are these displayed in different appstores? Should I build everything thing for windows store? (since this also includes phones)? Should I build and upload for both?
So clearly I have no idea what the difference is, which stores are available on which devices, which should I build with etc.
Hope somebody can give a clear explenation that would be really helpfull.
Windows Phone 8 target in Unity targets Windows Phone 8.0 OS. Windows Store target can target both Windows and Windows Phone 8.1+.
The store you upload your games is single, but depending on the target you’re targeting, only those devices or PCs will be able to download it. You can submit many packages of the same application targeting different OSs:
Windows Phone 8.0 (available to download for all windows phones running 8.0 OS or higher)
Windows Phone 8.1 (available to download for all windows phones running 8.1 OS or higher)
Windows 8.0 (available to download for all windows PCs and tablets running 8.0 OS or higher)
Windows 8.1 (available to download for all windows PCs and tablets running 8.1 OS or higher)
Windows 10 (available to download for all windows devices with a store (PCs, tablets, phones, etc) running 10.0 OS or higher)
You can make the first one by targeting Windows Phone 8 in Unity. You can target the rest by targeting Windows Store in Unity and selecting the appropriate SDK.
Generally, if you want your application to just be available to as many people as possible, you should make at least 2 packages, one for phone, and one for store. I suggest you target Windows and Windows Phone 8.1 as minimum, because there’s not many people still running 8.0 and the numbers are falling quickly:
We’re also dropping support for 8.0 OSs in Unity 5.3.
Now, probably the last question remains: why would you want to target Windows 10. There are a few reasons: you might want to take advantage of certain platform APIs that are not available on Windows 8.1. You might also want to target other Windows 10 devices apart from PCs, tablets and phones, which don’t run Windows 8.1 apps.
Thanks for your reply!
So if I understnad correctly;
When targeting windows phone, you target all mobile devices (phones). When targeting windows 10, you target everything, also mobile, but only if that mobile device has windows 10?
The reason I ask is because to me it seems that when you build a universal app, for windows, I don’t get why you would need to also do a build specifically for windows phone (since phones are included in this universal build).
But from what you say I think this is because some phones still only use the windows phone store, and only all windows 10 mobile devices use the same store as desktop etc? So in the future you would only need to use the windows store?
But to make sure all older windows phones can also find your app, you also publish through windows phone?
The reason to do that is because Windows 10 for phones is just starting to roll out these days, and majority of Windows Phone userbase is still on Windows Phone 8.1.
In the future, when Windows Phone 8.1 users upgrade to Windows 10, you’ll only need to publish one application.
Should I build for universal 8.1 or 10 from unity.
In other words, my preference would be 8.1, but I have no idea if these apps would show up on windows 10 store as well?
To reach all devices:
-build to windows store - universal 8.1 (if this also means these are available for windows 10 users).
if 8.1 apps are not available through the app store for windows 10 users, this would be a build for windows 10.
(but this would possible mean, that people with windows 8.1 will not see these apps).
-build to windows phone store - 8.1
This would mean all devices would be reached (apart from windows 8.0 phones).
Hope you can answer these questions, it just all pretty confusing
Ok great. So then a universal build for 8.1 and a phone 8.1 build should cover all devices (exept windows phone 8.0) right?
And the only reason for a specific universal windows 10 build would be if you need some features that only exists in windows 10 right?
Yes well I wonder if universal 8.1 runs on tablets & phones too, or just desktops.
In which case, even with a specific phone build, you would miss the tablets.
I wonder if the best might be just a universal windows 10 build and a phone 8.1 build.
In which case you would only miss the 8.1 tablets… but in time these will be updated to 10 anayway…
Looks like Universal 8.1 projects in Unity creates multiple projects that will give you TWO packages to upload to the Microsoft Store.
One that only works on desktops (Win 8.1 or Win 10)
Another that only works on Mobile. (Win 8.1 or Win 10)
One Unity project creates TWO binaries.
Universal 10 projects will create ONE package that you upload to the Microsoft Store. This single package works on all Windpws 10 desktop and mobile devices, but not any 8.1 devices.
One Unity project creates ONE binary.
What do you mean by tablets?
Windows Store apps that work on desktop also work on tablet. The only thing is that there were WindowsRT tables that have ARM processors, so you had to produce the separate binary. It looks like Microsoft abandoned them, now all new tables are x86.
So, to summarize:
Store 8.1 x86 binaries can run x86 desktops/tables running Windows 8.1 or Windows 10
Store 8.1 ARM binaries can run ARM tables running Windows 8.1 (don’t know if Win10 for those exists. If it does, it should be able to run 8.1 binaries)
Phone 8.1 binaries can run on Windows Phone 8.1 or Windows Phone 10
Universal 10 x86 binaries can run on any x86 device with Windows 10 (desktop, tablet, no x86 phone exists yet)
Universal 10 ARM binaries can run on any ARM device with Windows 10 (phone, Raspberry Pi, …).
So a universal 8.1 build should cover everything (except windows phone 8).
I was confused about tablets, since I thought they had a seperate store altogether, but it seems they dont.
