How to deploy a generated apk to a Wear OS device without Play Store

Question

For development and testing purposes I would like to install a (signed) apk on some different Wear OS-devices.

With android studio and ADB this is possible for devices in my local (wifi) network area.

As the app is not in a publishable state yet (it is still under development) I do not want to upload it to Google Play Store - I want some friends only to download and install it on their own wearables.

On phone or tablet devices this can be easily achieved by hosting the apk-file on a web server. By downloading it on the mobile device from there it can be installead just by accepting a security exception.

On a Wear OS wearable, however, I do not find any possibilities to download and install apk's directly. So I wonder how I can distribute a Wear OS-apk to some restricted users groups without Play Store? Anybody's any idea?

Thanx, Thomas

Answer 1

I would strongly advice you to use one of the internal test tracks that the Google Play Store provides.

1. It's already there and you're most likely familiar with the upload process
2. It's super easy to grant access to specific individuals or a group of people
3. It can easily be promoted into alpha/beta/production when you have a stable version