Kindle Fire App Updates

I realize this is a repeat of a post I had about a year….however, many of you will understand “why” if you follow the instructions below!

I thought it was time to blog about a tip as, after all, that’s part of this blog’s name! If you have a question, you can always email me (michael at fkbt dot com). If enough people ask the same question, I’ll probably answer it in a public forum like this as it usually means a lot more of you have the same question!

I’m frequently asked about updates to various apps people have purchased from the Amazon App Store – how much does it cost to get the upgrade, how do you find out about them, how do you install them, etc.?

The first question is pretty easy: if an app publisher, including my own little company, updates an app in the Amazon App Store, you get it for free. Updates to apps generally revolve around bug fixes or minor improvements, so why should you have to pay again for an update?

Finding out about an update can be a little tricky: on my Android-enabled phone, I do get notifications of upgrades / updates and it is easy to just tap an icon or two, the update installs, and I move on with life. With the Fire, however, it can be a little tricky to see if you have any available updates – the original Kindle Fire used to be easy, but with software upgrades to the Fire’s operating system, the release of several new versions of the Fire, I’ve found out the hard way I had available updates that needed to be installed. Sometimes the apps update automatically, sometimes the apps send you a notification if you would like to update, and sometimes you just don’t know unless you know how to check it manually.

All that being said, and assuming you want to manually check and see, how do you find out if you have updates available to your aps and how do you install them? To check out if you have available updates on your Kindle Fire for apps you have purchased from the Amazon App Store, just follow these steps:

• Turn on your Kindle Fire, and make sure your wireless feature is on.

• From the Home Screen, tap the “Apps” icon at the top of the screen.

• Tap the “Store” icon in the upper right-hand portion of your screen.

• Tap the menu icon at the bottom-center of your screen if you have an older Fire (it looks like a representation of a piece of paper to me, or a box with three horizontal lines) or the top left or bottom right if you have a newer Fire.

• Tap the “App Updates” option on the new pop-up menu. Who knows, you might be surprised at what apps have been updated and are available?

• Tap the “Update” icon to the right of the app(s) you would like to update.

• If the previous version of the app is still on your Fire, you should receive a warning message it can’t update unless you remove the previous version. To install the new version, you must remove the old version.

Hope that helps!

Michael

 

Download the Free Kindle Books and Tips blog app for your Kindle Fire or Android-based smartphone or tablet – for free, of course – by clicking here or type in http://smarturl.it/fkbtfreeapp into your computer’s web browser from the Amazon App Store or click here or type in http://bit.ly/fkbtgoogle into your computer’s web browser for the Google App Store.

 

Organize your books on your Kindle Fire with the Collections and Categories App! Click Here or type in http://smarturl.it/firecollections into your web browser to get it now!