What is versionCode on Android?

An Android app has two version settings. versionName is the version people see, such as 2.4.0. versionCode is an internal number: Google describes it as a positive integer where a higher number means a more recent version, and says it isn’t the number shown to users. Android itself uses it to prevent downgrades: a device won’t install an APK with a lower versionCode than the one already installed.

The stores rely on it too. Google says you can’t upload an APK to the Play Store with a versionCode you have already used for a previous version, and the largest value it allows is 2100000000. Google’s advice is to start at 1 and raise it with every release, whether that release is major or minor, so the code soon stops looking like the version name. On the Amazon Appstore, a version can go live only if its version code is greater than the live version’s.

In a React Native or native project it is set in android/app/build.gradle; in Expo, android.versionCode in the app config. The iOS equivalent is the build number.

In VibeView. With "autoIncrement": true on a production profile, every production build gets the next number from a counter VibeView keeps per app and platform, passed to your build as VIBEVIEW_BUILD_NUMBER for your versionCode. An amazon profile takes its number from the same counter as your Google Play builds. Builds → Stores → your app → Edit → Build number shows the newest version code VibeView sent to Google Play and raises the counter; vibeview versions set does it from the command line. See Automatic build numbers.