More than most · 70 of 217 storefronts
What is censored in Iraq?
Google Play in Iraq looks typical: about as many widely-used apps are missing here as in most others Google operates. 23.1% of the apps with 10,000+ user ratings worldwide that we have tested here are unavailable but still available somewhere else — 303 of 1,312, against 18.4% for the typical storefront.
303 widely-used apps unavailable here1,312 widely-used apps tested here = 23.1%
What this number counts, and what it cannot show
Of the apps we have tested here that have at least 10,000 user ratings worldwide and are still on sale somewhere, the share you cannot get here. Both sides of the fraction are what we tested in this storefront, so an app we have not tested here is in neither and cannot move the figure either way — which is the whole reason this is a share and not a count. Nothing about how widely an app is distributed enters it, so an app sold in one other storefront counts exactly as much as one sold in all 217.
303 of the 1,312 widely-used apps we have tested here are unavailable — 23.1%. · median 18.4%
This correlates 0.51 with how many apps we have tested here — better than a raw count of missing apps, slightly worse than the fixed-basket count it replaced, because which widely-used apps we happened to test here is not a random sample of them. Its other weakness is shared by every version of this measure: a region-locked app is missing from nearly every storefront, so about three-quarters of a typical share is a floor almost everyone stands on. That is why the middle of the ranking is much flatter than its ends, and why a rank in the middle should not be read as a finding.
Measured Oct 9, 2026
Which notable apps are missing, by kind
The 218 apps above, sorted by what kind of app each one is. We watched 5 of them disappear from this storefront; the rest have been absent for as long as we have been testing here.
How these kinds are worked out
218 widely-used apps are missing here, sorted by what they are. Every one is classified from its name and Google’s own category, so nothing is left out and nothing depends on a list being kept up to date: 44 of the 218 fall into a kind we defined — VPNs, news, messaging, privacy tools and so on — and the rest are shown under Google’s own category. Within each kind the most-reviewed apps come first, because the point is which apps people actually use.
Each kind is shown twice over: the apps in it people actually use, and the same apps by when they went. Of the 218, we watched 5 disappear from this storefront, 2 of them in the last year. The rest have been absent for as long as we have been testing here, which is a different thing from having been removed and is shown as such.
Names are matched conservatively, and the misses are the deliberate kind: an app called "IP Location Changer" is a VPN and is caught by name, while a privacy browser is filed under privacy rather than VPN. Google’s category is used wherever it is the better answer — every news app it labels `News` is one, whereas a name rule for "news" also catches a football-scores app and a jobs board. Dates are when we last saw an app available here, and we have been testing this storefront since — anything that went before then is counted as missing but not as removed.
VPN and proxy14
Most used
- Psiphon VPN: Secure Access
- ExpressVPN: VPN Fast & Secure
- فیلتر شکن قوی پرسرعت Maple VPN
- Surfshark: Secure VPN service
- Norton VPN – Fast & Secure
and 9 more
Most recently gone
Social and messaging16
Most used
- VK: music, video, messenger
- TextNow: Call + Text Unlimited
- Josh - Live Calls & Chat
- Text Free: Second Phone Number
- Text Me: Second Phone Number
and 11 more
Most recently gone
News5
LGBTQ+2
Most used
Most recently gone
Dating6
Most used
- happn: dating app
- Hinge Dating App: Match & Date
- Fruitz - Dating app
- Feeld: Open & Curious Dating
- Mint - Dating
and 1 more
Most recently gone
Gambling and betting1
Most used
Most recently gone
Shopping47
Entertainment242 in the last year
Finance16
Most used
- Cash App
- PayPal - Pay, Send, Save
- Klarna: Smarter everyday money
- Chime® – Fee-Free Banking
- Coinbase: Buy Crypto & Stocks
and 11 more
Most recently gone
Food and drink15
Most used
and 10 more
Most recently gone
Strategy9
Most used
- Garena Liên Quân Mobile
- Garena RoV: Abyssal Rift
- LINE Rangers & CODE GEASS
- Garena 傳說對決:十週年裂隙穿梭版本
- LMHT: Tốc Chiến
and 4 more
Most recently gone
Music and audio7
Business6
Most used
and 1 more
Most recently gone
Comics5
Health and fitness5
Sports5
Action4
Most recently gone
Lifestyle4
Most used
Most recently gone
Productivity4
Most recently gone
Role playing4
Most recently gone
Education3
Most recently gone
Tools3
Most recently gone
Maps and navigation2
Most recently gone
Travel and local2
Most used
Most recently gone
Video players and editors2
Most recently gone
Adventure1
Most used
Most recently gone
Beauty1
Most used
Most recently gone
Casual1
Most used
Most recently gone
Dating1
Most used
Most recently gone
Historical1
Most used
Most recently gone
House and home1
Most used
Most recently gone
Music1
Most used
Most recently gone
How we test
The total at the top of the page is every app we have tested here that we cannot get but that is still available somewhere — 23.1% of the 1,312 apps we have tested in this storefront, at any size. How many we have tested differs eightfold between storefronts, so that total compares poorly across countries. It is the share beside it, whose denominator is what we tested here, that is comparable.
Availability is checked against Google’s own catalog servers for every storefront, the same way Google Play app asks. "Unavailable" means Google’s servers say the app cannot be offered in that country — it does not say who asked for the removal. Removals initiated by the developer and removals demanded by governments look the same from outside; the history and context on this page are how we tell them apart.