The Microsoft Store, formerly known as the Windows Store, is infamous. We said in 2017 that after years of operation and upgrades and improvements, sorry it still sucks. A rumor surfaced in April suggesting that Microsoft was planning a new store that doesn’t suck – a bold move – but in July we were still waiting, not too optimistic.
Today, Microsoft announced a new policy that I think doesn’t suck: make third-party storefront apps available on the Microsoft Store, starting with Amazon and the Epic Games Store.
“Like any other app, third-party storefront apps will have a product detail page that can be found through search or browsing, so users can easily find and install it with the same confidence as any. another Microsoft Store app on Windows, â€wrote Giorgio Sardo, Microsoft Store CEO, in a Windows blog post. “Today, we’re sharing that Amazon and Epic Games will be bringing their storefront apps to the Microsoft Store in the coming months, and we look forward to welcoming more stores in the future.â€
This does not mean that you will be browsing the Epic Store through the Microsoft Store, but that the EGS storefront app will be available for download and installation through it. Other applications for external storefronts could follow, notably Steam. It’s different from the Amazon Appstore integration announced earlier this year, which will allow users to discover and install Android apps on Amazon from the Microsoft Store, but it fits with what Sardo described as the Microsoft’s commitment to create “an open store for an open platform,†a point it already made in a blog post in June.
Windows 11 is slated to roll out to everyone on October 5, but is available now for everyone in the Windows Insider program. Sardo said a preview of Amazon Appstore’s integration into the Microsoft Store will begin “soon”.
