Free & Open Source
Every App Fair app is fully free and open source. Anyone can inspect the code, contribute improvements, or reuse it for the benefit of the wider community.
The App Fair Project
The free and open-source app store for the iPhone and Android
The App Fair Project is a non-profit charitable organization dedicated to the creation of mobile software applications for the public good. The project was founded in 2022 as a worldwide nexus for free apps to be built, distributed, and maintained.
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Free
Apps distributed through the App Fair Project are free, not just in terms of money, but also in that they respect the four essential freedoms of free software.
No ads
Advertisements are rife in the commercial app stores, and are the most common avenue for monetizing commercial applications that purport to be “free”. App Fair apps do not include any native advertising or ad-tech.
Open source
Trust but verify. App Fair apps are guaranteed to be 100% open-source software, so every component that goes into them is freely available for open review, security audits, and public scrutiny. Nothing is hidden from you when you are using an App Fair app.
No tracking
Surreptitious and non-consensual tracking is rife on the commercial app stores, with little or no oversight. Your privacy matters to us: App Fair apps contain no tracking, telemetry, analytics, or other spyware.
Every release is submitted to the App Fair for review and approval before it enters the catalog, and the App Fair then publishes it to the App Store and Google Play. Distribution through F-Droid and AltStore is on the roadmap.
What makes an App Fair app
Built for users, not advertisers
App Fair apps cost nothing and contain no built-in ad-tech or non-consensual tracking technologies. They do not attempt to monetize the attention of the user in any way. They are created from free and open-source software and are funded solely by donations and grants.
No Advertisements or Ad-Tech
App Fair apps never show ads. There is no attention harvesting, no engagement manipulation, and no incentive to optimize for clicks instead of users.
Available Everywhere
App Fair apps are distributed both through the commercial app stores — the Apple App Store and Google Play Store — as well as alternative marketplaces like AltStore and F-Droid.
No In-App Purchases
App Fair apps do not monetize end users in any way. No subscriptions, no in-app purchases, and no paywalls — the full experience is available to everyone.
Digital Public Goods
App Fair projects are digital public goods, built by the community and funded by donations and grants to serve society.
Privacy-Respecting by Design
App Fair apps contain no trackers, no spyware, and request no unnecessary permissions. Your data stays on your device unless sharing is essential and explicit.
The Four Cornerstones
The qualities of an App Fair App
They build on the Four Essential Freedoms of free software, and extend them with the reach, language, and ability that make a free application's freedom meaningful for a global mobile audience.
Transparent
Open to inspection, modification, and redistribution by anyone. The source, the build configuration, and every dependency are published under free and open-source licences.
Ubiquitous
Available on every mobile platform. A single codebase ships as a native iOS app and a native Android app, with the same features on each.
Global
Speaks the user's language. Every string is externalized, the supported locales are kept current, and the store listing is translated alongside the app.
Accessible
Usable across the spectrum of abilities: screen readers, the largest text sizes, switch control, and sufficient contrast, built in from the first commit.
How it works
Developers build in the open. The App Fair does the rest.
Each release is checked against the developer's own published build before it is accepted.
Build in the open
A developer creates the app in their own repository, under the GNU General Public License, with every dependency free and open source.
Submitted for review
When a release is ready, it is submitted to the App Fair, where it is reviewed against the inclusion criteria and approved for the catalog.
Published to the stores
Approved releases are published by the App Fair to the App Store and Google Play, and users install them from the store they already use.
From the blog
Latest writing
A Gatekeeper's Paradise: the App Fair response to the first review of the Digital Markets Act
The European Commission has published its first review of the Digital Markets Act, the landmark regulation that was supposed to break the stranglehold of Big Tech gatekeepers on…
Read more →Fear and Loathing in the App Stores
I presented a talk on the FOSDEM main track in Brussels last weekend titled "Fear and Loathing in the App Stores" (abstract). It was amazing to see so much interest in the topic,…
Read more →App Fair Retrospective, 2025
As 2025 draws to a close, it's a good moment to pause and reflect on a year that proved to be both challenging and energizing for the App Fair Project. Building on the momentum of…
Read more →Help build a catalog of digital public goods
The App Fair is funded solely by donations and grants. Your support pays for the development, review, and infrastructure that keep the catalog free for everyone.