Google on Thursday announced the company’s annual list of top games and apps on the Play Store in India. The Google Play Best of 2023 awards have focussed on apps that help users with personal growth, mental health, self-care, and online shopping. The company also points out that several developers are also leveraging AI to bring learning or wellness features to their apps — SwiftChat, Stimuler, and Level SuperMind are some of the Google Play Best of 2023 apps in India.
This year, Google Play’s Best App of the year is Level SuperMind, an app that is looking to bring the pursuit of optimal mind performance on par with that of physical fitness, while THAP: Your Happiness Gym was the User’s Choice App of 2023. On the other hand, Monopoly Go! was Google Play’s Best Game of the year, while Subway Surfers Blast picked up the User’s Choice award in the gaming segment.
Stimuler — an app that helps non-native English speakers prepare for IELTS tests — and chatbot-based learning platform SwiftChat were both awarded the Best with AI award by the search giant. In the Best for Fun category, Google picked Threads — launched by Meta earlier this year as a competitor to X (formerly Twitter) — along with social networking platform Pepul and comics app Dashtoon.
Another notable app that was selected as one of Google’s Best App(s) for Good award was Autism BASICS — an adaptive early intervention app that makes teaching and learning easy for parents of children with autism and other special needs.
Google has awarded gaming titles across various categories
Photo Credit: Google
The company also awarded apps designed for larger screens and wearables as part of the Google Play Best of 2023 list. Canva, Everand, and Concepts were the best apps for tablets, while FlipaClip, Evernote, and Wideo were the top picks in the Best for Chromebooks category. Both WhatsApp and Audible were awarded the Best for Watches award.
SuperGaming’s Battle Stars won the Best Made in India award, while Call of Dragons, Road to Valor: Empires, and Undawn were the best multiplayer titles picked by Google. Honkai: Star Rail, MementoMori, and Lost Words: Beyond the Page were the titles that won the Best Story award. Meanwhile, Kurukshetra: Ascension, Block Heads, and Vampire Survivors were selected for the Best Indie category.
After its return to the Play Store in India earlier this year, Krafton’s Battlegrounds Mobile India (also known as BGMI) joined Pokémon Go, and EA Sports FC Mobile Soccer as the Best Ongoing titles in India. Popular title Asphalt 9: Legends was the only title picked for the Best for Google Play Games on PC, while Viking Rise, Doomsday: Last Survivors, and Call of Dragons won the Best for Tablets award — Call of Dragons was also the only title selected for Best Multi-device Game.
You can read the complete list of the best apps and games — including those created by Indian developers and publishers — selected for Google Play’s Best of 2023 awards on the company’s blog post.