Enabling Rich Snippets for Software Apps

When you mark up software application information in the body of a web page, Google can identify it and, when users search for apps, use this information to better display your app details in search results.

We are currently piloting this feature with a restricted set of initial data providers. We hope to soon open up the feature so any provider who implements spec-compliant markup is eligible to participate.

Here's an example of a rich snippet for a mobile application:

Properties

An application can have a number of different properties which you can label using the following extension to theSchema.org vocabulary. For each app, you can include nested Things (information types supported by the schema.org vocabulary—for example, Review or Offer).

Properties in plural indicate that the markup can contain multiple instances for each properties (e.g. reviews or offers implies that more than one review or offer can be included in the markup).

The name property is required. In addition, rich snippets are currently only shown for software applications that provide at least two of the following:

• aggregateRating (including ratingValue and either ratingCount or reviewCount)
• offers (including price and currency)
• operatingSystem
• applicationCategory

Properties for all SoftwareApplication types

The following properties apply to all types of software applications:

• Thing > CreativeWork > SoftwareApplication type and subtypes

Property	Type	Description
name (Required)	Text	The name of the app.
aggregateRating	AggregateRating	The aggregate rating of the app.
offers	Offer	An offer to sell the app. For developers, Offer can indicate the marketplaces that carry the application. For marketplaces, use to indicate the price of the application for a specific app instance.
operatingSystem	Text	Operating systems required (for example, "Windows 7", "OSX 10.6", "Android 1.6")
applicationCategory	Text or URL	The type of software application (for example, BusinessApplication or GameApplication). Must be one of the supported software application types.

Extended properties for app subtypes

For mobile applications and web applications, Google also supports the following property extensions:

• Thing > CreativeWork > SoftwareApplication > MobileApplication
• Thing > CreativeWork > SoftwareApplication > WebApplication

Marking up code

The following HTML code identifies a mobile software app and lists several of its features.

JSON-LDMICRODATARDFA

<script type="application/ld+json">

{

  "@context": "http://schema.org/",

  "@type": "SoftwareApplication",

  "name": "Angry Birds",

  "operatingSystem": "ANDROID",

  "applicationCategory": "http://schema.org/GameApplication",

  "aggregateRating":{

    "@type": "AggregateRating",

    "ratingValue": "4.6",

    "ratingCount": "8864"

  },

  "offers":{

    "@type": "Offer",

    "price": "1.00",

    "priceCurrency": "USD"

  }

}

</script>

Here's how this sample works:

• Each listed app is enclosed in a <div>, like this: <div itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/SoftwareApplication">. itemscope indicates that the HTML enclosed in the <div> is an item, and itemtype="http://schema.org/SoftwareApplication" indicates that the item is a mobile software app.
• Each <div> describes properties of the app, such as its name, and required operating system. To label app properties, each element containing one of these properties, such as <div> or <span> is assigned an itemprop attribute. For example, <span itemprop="name">Angry Birds</span>.
• The app includes nested Review and Offer information.