Amazon Underground Circumvents Google Play And Offers Premium Apps For Totally Free

Since the Amazon Kindle Fire, Amazon has always been into Android, trying to make it “better.”

After breaking and tweaking the Android to power its Kindle Fire devices, its recent “hack” for the Android is the “Amazon Underground,” which features absolutely free apps, curated for the freebie-loving Android and Kindle. In fact, Amazon Underground is not just a collection of existing free Android apps, it also has a treasure trove of premium apps, made totally free, because Amazon found a good way to compensate developers for their hard work, while throwing millions of premium app gifts for the end user.

According to Tech Crunch, Amazon compensates the devs for the length of time that a user enjoys the app. Amazon itself will monitor the minutes of use by the end users, and will compensate the developer accordingly. A novel approach, which will effectively eschew the mobile ad platform system. How Amazon hopes to earn from Amazon Underground is yet unclear, however.

Amazon Underground has all the features of Amazon’s shopping apps, plus the free premium apps. When you have this on your device, it’s your ticket to a whole virtual shopping mall, plus a wonderland of most of the apps you’ve always wanted, sans ads.

However, you will have to install the app as an “unknown source,” or “sideload” it. First, you have to download the app from Amazon’s page. Then, you go to Settings > Security > Device Administration, then click “Unknown Sources.” There’s a note there that explains the option, “Allow installation of apps from sources other than the Play store.” Then go back to the Amazon Underground app in your Downloads folder, double tap, and install Amazon Underground.

Amazon Underground is banned from Google Play Store, which explains why you have to download it direct from Amazon. Amazon’s other existing apps such as Amazon Shopping, Amazon Kindle, Amazon Cloud Drive, among others, will remain on the Play Store.

Get Amazon Underground from www.amazon.com/underground.