Google is Banning Sugar Daddy Apps From Play Store - Where are Sugar Daddies and Sugar Babies Going

Jul 21, 2023

Just like the way Apple removed sugar daddy apps from their App Store in April 2018, Google is also planning on removing any app that projects “sugar relationships” (I.e. any sort of companionship that facilitates sexual acts in exchange for gifts or money) from play store starting from the 1st of next month (September 1) this year (2021). Google’s aim of putting a ban on sugar daddy apps on play store is a decision they have decided to make in letting their platform remain respectful and safe against anything that could be interpreted as intimate encounters in exchange for monetary rewards or gifts. 

According to the official statement released by Google in response to their banning of sugar daddy apps from their app store, they are saying in essence that they are prohibiting services that could be viewed as offering sexual acts in exchange for compensation from the play store: “As a platform we are always excited to support our developer partners, but we also work hard to provide a safe experience for users. We have updated our inappropriate content policy to prohibit apps that facilitate sexual acts in exchange for compensation following feedback we received from NGOs, governments, and other user advocacy groups concerned with user safety. This aligns our policies with other Google policies and industry norms. This aligns our policies with other Google policies and industry norms.”

Google’s latest action against the existence of sugar relationships related apps in their space has been predicted to have happened as a result of the 2018 FOSTA bill signed by President Donald Trump. Also, the new policies by Google are against violence, hate speech, sensitive events (such as health crisis, conflict, death, natural disasters, atrocities, or other tragic event), bullying and harassment, dangerous products, tobacco, alcohol and marijuana. That is not all, the new principles of action proposed by Google also comes with the plan of suspending the accounts of developers that that have been abandoned or inactive for more than a year and also implementing new requirements in family policies on identifiers that are used in apps pointed towards minors.  

What tags an App a Sugar Daddy App?

Sugar Daddy apps are also known as incentivized companionship apps. Software applications of this nature has to do with sugar relationship involving younger folks dating older people for monetary benefits in exchange for sexual company. 

For instance, a young lady in one of the sugar daddy apps could decide to date an older well-off man (called sugar daddy) that has plenty of expensive gifts and money to give to her in exchange for her moment with him. Another instance that buttresses what this kind of apps stand for is when younger grown men date older wealthy women (commonly known as sugar mummies) in a compensated sexual relationship. 

Who is a Sugar Daddy or Sugar Mummy?

A sugar daddy or sugar mummy is a term for any individual with high purchasing power who financially supports one or more young women or men in exchange for his/her company. 

Examples of sugar daddy apps are Sugar Daddy Meet, Sugar Daddy, Sugar Daddy Dating, Spoil, Suger Daddy just to mention a few of them. 

Why has Google decided to remove Sugar Daddy Apps?

Google’s decision to remove all sugar daddy apps from their platform starting from September 1 is a move they are trying to achieve by placing restrictions on sexual content, specifically prohibiting compensated sexual relationships. This simply means that every sugar daddy apps that are currently still available in the play store will be banned in less than 2weeks from now and any sugar daddy related apps too won’t be able to be added to the Google’s app store again. 

This decision Google has made might also lead to other platforms vetoing against anything that is related to sugar daddy apps from their respective tech spaces too in a bid to support the act against promoting practices as questionable as it is controversial. 

Will Sugar Daddies and Sugar Babies Disappear?

The absolute answer is no. The removal of sugar daddy apps from Google play store won’t drastically affect the numbers of sugar daddies and babies in any way. There are different ways people interested in this kind of business can practice what they do but the only thing is that they won’t just have the sugar daddy apps to download from play store again because of the ban.

Another interesting thing worthy of note here is that sugar dating (just like sex work) has been around in one form or the other even before the advancement in technology in building mobile apps or creating online platforms for them in streamlining the process of meeting like-minded individuals interested in it and sugar dating will also continue to exist irrespective of any attempted internet policing made against it.  

Where are Sugar Daddies and Sugar Babies Going

Though sugar daddy apps won’t be available for users to access from play store again starting from the first of next month, people interested in the sugar dating of a thing are still going to be able to sideload the sugar daddy apps onto their respective phones. What does side-loading mean? Sideloading can be best described as a term used for downloading apps packages (or APK) of different apps directly onto Android phones.  In other words, side loading is a way of circumventing the Google’s play store to download and install applications onto phones. One of the biggest dangers of having to download and install apps via this approach is that they are mostly vulnerable to security threats from third-parties, hence Android phones users are often warned against it. 

And the mobile terminal is already very mature, the website has more features and more privacy. The word’s popular sugar daddy dating sites, such as Sugar Daddy Meet, etc.

If sugar daddies and sugar babies are scared of sideloading apps onto their phones because of security reasons, another available alternative for them is to go back to traditional dating apps such as Hinge, Tinder (just to mention a few of them) to continue practicing what is related to sugar dating because of the latest Google ban of apps such as Sugar Daddy Meet from the Google’s platform.