3 min read App Distribution

Why Mobile Teams Switch from Firebase App Distribution

Firebase App Distribution is good enough when you're a solo developer or a team of three. You upload a build, invite testers by email, they get a notification. Simple.

Then your team grows to 10, 20, 50 people. You start shipping weekly. You have QA, product managers, stakeholders, and external beta testers. And suddenly Firebase's simplicity becomes a limitation.

Here's what teams consistently report when they outgrow Firebase — and what they do about it.

The Five Things Firebase Doesn't Do

1. No Task Management

A tester finds a bug in your build. In Firebase, they… send you a Slack message? File a Jira ticket manually? There's no way to create, track, or resolve issues inside the distribution workflow.

Teams need built-in task management where bugs discovered during testing are tracked alongside the build that triggered them. Even better: bidirectional sync with Jira or Linear so issues flow automatically between your testing platform and project management tool.

With Firebase, every tester needs a Google account and must be explicitly invited. That works for internal teams but fails for:

  • External beta testers who don't have Google accounts
  • Client demos where you need a shareable link
  • QA contractors who need quick access
  • Stakeholders who just want to tap a link and install

Public install pages let anyone install with a link — no account required. You can still control access, but you remove the friction that blocks your testing velocity.

3. No Quality Gates

When is a build ready to ship? Firebase can't answer that. It distributes builds — that's it. There's no concept of:

  • Blocker tracking — flagging critical issues that must be resolved before release
  • SLA monitoring — tracking whether bugs are being addressed in time
  • Launch checklists — ensuring QA, PM, legal, and other stakeholders have all signed off

Quality playbooks turn "I think it's ready" into "all 12 checklist items are verified and all 3 blockers are resolved."

4. Locked into Google's Ecosystem

Firebase App Distribution lives inside the Firebase Console. Your builds are on Google's infrastructure. Your analytics are in Google's format. If your team uses AWS or Azure, you're running a split infrastructure.

Teams that need external storage on their own S3 or GCS buckets can't do that with Firebase. For regulated industries (fintech, healthcare), this is often a dealbreaker.

5. No Team Activity Visibility

With Firebase, you upload a build and hope people install it. You can see download counts, but you can't see:

  • Who has installed and who hasn't
  • Who gave feedback vs. who's been silent
  • Whether QA has started testing this build
  • The real-time activity on your release

Activity feeds and installation tracking give team leads visibility into the actual testing progress — not just "it was distributed."

What the Switch Looks Like

Teams typically switch in an afternoon. The process:

  1. Set up your workspace — create your account, invite your team
  2. Connect your CI/CD — GitHub Actions, Fastlane, Bitrise, or TA-CLI for any pipeline
  3. Upload your first build — create a release and distribute to your team
  4. Set up notifications — Slack or Microsoft Teams for automated alerts
  5. Connect your issue tracker — Jira or Linear for bidirectional issue sync

Your existing Firebase testers just need a new install link. No migration tool needed — you're not migrating data, you're upgrading your workflow.

When Firebase Is Still Fine

To be fair, Firebase App Distribution works well for:

  • Solo developers testing on their own devices
  • Teams of 2-3 who communicate face-to-face
  • Projects where you're already deep in the Firebase ecosystem (Crashlytics, Remote Config, etc.)
  • Simple distribute-and-forget workflows where tracking isn't important

If that describes your team, stick with Firebase. But if you're reading this, you've probably already hit the ceiling.

The Real Comparison

See our detailed Firebase App Distribution vs TestApp.io comparison for the full feature-by-feature breakdown, or read our Firebase alternatives guide to understand all your options.

The teams that switch typically share the same story: Firebase was great when they were small, but as soon as they needed task management, quality gates, or team workflows, they needed a dedicated platform built specifically for mobile distribution.