An archery logging app hits #7 in the Saudi Top Grossing chart: Bowken isn't selling archery
What it is On the surface, an archery practice log: tap shot placements on a target face, see group dispersion, save sight notes, and unlock the round review page with credits.
Why it took off Archery users didn't drive it. After an update, off-store installs flooded in across 20-some countries the next day. Then a few big in-app purchases at a top price of SAR 349.99 pushed it onto the Sports Top Grossing charts in small countries like Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Turkey. Sister apps from the same template kept launching and being pulled, and it's inferred that after review, users were shown a different set of paid content.
EHow you could approach it Don't. The only thing worth borrowing is an observation: the Top Grossing bar in small-country niche categories like the Gulf states, Turkey, and Israel is low. A legitimate vertical tool with solid localization can get cheap visibility there. Conversely, when you see an app rated around 0 that ranks top 20 in several countries' Top Grossing, treat it as a shell package first.
- Data (updated daily) · Launched 2026-10-25 · Turkey rating 2 · 11-08 charted in 19 stores
iOS · best category chart rank · by store JapanFranceCanadaData 2026-11-05 → 2026-11-08 (4 days, 4 observations). Lower rank is higher; gaps mean it wasn't charted that dayiOS · Rating count · Turkey Data 2026-11-05 → 2026-11-08 (4 days, 4 observations). Apple doesn't publish download counts; rating growth is a proxy for downloads.
Bowken, an archery practice logging app, launched in Oct 25. Starting Nov 4, it appeared on App Store charts in 30 countries within three days, with its best Sports Top Grossing rank at #7 in Saudi Arabia. Only 3 people in the world have rated it, and the only review says it 「has sexual content」. This isn't a niche tool suddenly discovered by archery fans. It's a batch-launch, swap-content-after-review playbook. Below: how it climbed the charts, where the money comes from, and why you shouldn't follow it.
An Arabic one-star review
On Nov 3, Bowken got its first review on the Saudi App Store, 1 stars:
「تطبيق غير لائق بالمجتمع / يوجد محتوى جنسي」: This app is inappropriate for society; it contains sexual content.
But the store page says something else: 「Bowken is for people who practice archery and want to remember what happened while standing on the shooting line.」 Log a set's bow, arrows, distance, a note and a photo; tap each arrow's landing spot on a digital target to see whether the group drifts left or right, high or low, and how tight it is; save a sight note for each distance. The English copy is restrained and clean, and it even says 「Bowken is not a scoring judge, please only shoot in safe, permitted places.」
An archery log, rated 17+ in the US store, self-declaring 「occasional / mild adult, suggestive content」. That's the first mismatch.
How it reached charts in 30 countries in three days
The timeline is clean (App Store charts by region, 11-04 to 11-06):
| Date | What happened | Countries charted | Global new ratings |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10-25 | Listed 1.0.0 | 0 | — |
| 11-03 | Release 1.1.0, with release notes like 「optimized list loading logic, fixed color display deviation」, boilerplate phrasing | 0 | — |
| 11-04 | First charted: Saudi Sports Top Free #3 | 10 | 0 |
| 11-05 | Saudi Sports Top Grossing #7, Israel #8, Croatia #8, Turkey #10 | 29 | 0 |
| 11-06 | Oman, Kuwait, UAE, Japan, and Canada also show ranks | 30 | 3 |
At the same time it also entered the Sports Top Free charts in about 20 regions including Estonia, Cyprus, Bahrain, Norway, Slovakia, and Qatar (ranks 18 to 190). Twenty-odd countries appearing at once while ratings stay flat doesn't look like users finding it organically in the store. It looks like a batch of installs were pushed in from off-store (inferred). It's English-only, the title is just 「Bowken」, and it doesn't rely on search to begin with. X, TikTok and the web show no one talking about it.
The chart climb came right after the 1.1.0 update. In Chinese indie circles this is called 「the AB side」: the A side, a legitimate small tool, is what Apple reviews; after approval, a remote switch shows real users the B side. What Bowken's B side is can't be seen from outside. But the self-declared 17+ suggestive content, that one-star review, and the in-app purchases below all point to paid social or video chat types (inferred, unverified).
Where the money comes from: the most expensive tier sells best
In the store description, there's only one place you pay: to turn a set of archery into a one-page 「Round Review」, you spend 30 Range Credits. Logging itself is free.
For this review page, it has 10 in-app purchase tiers, named 「Bowken Steal Tag 01–07」 and 「Core Tag 04/07/08」. In the Saudi store they run from SAR 4.99 to SAR 349.99, up to $79.99 in the US store, and up to ¥13,000 in the Japan store (Saudi App Store page, 11-06). The names have nothing to do with archery.
What's more telling is which tier is selling. Japan's app chart tracker applion shows Bowken's in-app purchase sales: the No. 1 item is the ¥13,000 Steal Tag 07, No. 2 is ¥2,000, and No. 3 is ¥300. The US store's AppInsider also ranks the Steal Tag 07 in its top three. An archery logbook with only 3 ratings, where the most expensive tier sells best: that's the pattern of livestream and social app "coin top-ups," not spending you'd expect from archery enthusiasts.
The money turns into rank so quickly partly because of where it picks. In the Sports category of Saudi Arabia, Israel, Turkey, Croatia, and small Gulf states, the Top Grossing bar is low, so a few purchases of a few hundred riyals can get into the top 10 (inferred).
It's not the only one
Two apps with nearly identical looks, launched the same day as Bowken with App IDs only a few thousand apart:
| App | Shell | Launched | Now (11-06) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bowken | Archery log | 10-25 | Live, charting in 30 countries |
| Sovrin. | Travel | 10-25 | Once charted #3 in Kenya Travel Top Grossing and #11 in Israel; now not findable in the US, Saudi, or Turkey |
| Trekly, | Travel footprint | 10-25 | Live, 17+, IAP named 「Trekly Mass Value 01–06」, top price ₺3,999.99, in the top 11 of Travel Top Grossing in Jordan, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia |
| Sharlo | Fashion editor outfit log | Around August | Pulled, IAP likewise named Steal Tag / Core Tag, top price $129.99 |
| Mixora | Gear maintenance log | Around August | Pulled, Steal Tag / Core Tag |
The pattern is consistent: an extremely vertical 「private log」; a personal-name developer account that holds only this one app, while the copyright belongs to another company (Bowken's is a Bulgarian company suffix, 「Bowken EOOD」); IAP names built from 「app name + two random words + a number」; the privacy policy hosted on an unrelated domain (bladen.shop) under a random path; and a utility app self-declaring suggestive content. The August batch has already disappeared, and one of the October batch has been pulled. Each shell's lifespan is roughly measured in weeks.
Who's building archery logs
If you look only at archery itself: Archery Scoresheets (2018 years old, 562 ratings on the US store), ArcherySuccess (2017 years old, 293 ratings, $14.99 one-time purchase, hit logging plus dispersion analysis, covers everything Bowken does), Rcherz (733 ratings), Rise, Ishi Archery, plus a long tail of apps with single-digit ratings. This is a small niche that people have been building for a decade, and even the leaders have only a few hundred ratings. Bowken's features are a subset of these products, and its chart presence has nothing to do with archery.
If it were you
One line: stay away. What it can lend you is not a product but a very high-risk playbook, and Apple has just named that playbook for a crackdown.
- Not a fit for anyone who wants to build a product for the long haul. In Oct 16 of 2026, Apple added 2.5.19 new rules: apps that turn into something else after approval get pulled, and the developer account gets banned. Apple also said it banned 193k fraudulent developer accounts in 2025. These apps are disappearing one after another, paying the price for it.
- The thing that actually makes it work is out of your reach. The premium B-side content that people pay ¥13,000 for, the off-store traffic that pushes installs into two dozen countries at once, the pool of fake-name accounts and shell companies you can burn at will, none of that shows up on the store page, and no solo indie dev can build it.
- The archery log itself isn't worth building. The older apps already have the full feature set, the leaders have only a few hundred ratings, and Bowken's chart placement didn't come from archery users.
- The one takeaway worth keeping: niche Top Grossing charts in the Gulf states, Turkey, Israel and small Eastern European countries have a low bar, and a few high-priced in-app purchases can put you in the top 10. If you have a real vertical tool, localizing well into Arabic and Turkish and going after category Top Grossing in these stores for visibility is a cheap move. The reverse also applies: when you see an app that launched recently, has almost no ratings, and is in the top 20 of Top Grossing across many countries, suspect a front app before you read it as validated demand.
- What would mean I got it wrong: if Bowken is still listed at the end of 2026, its ratings climb into the hundreds, and reviews show real people talking about archery, then it may have a real archery audience. But even then, the only thing worth watching would be the small archery-log niche, not this playbook.
Research notes: competitor table, acquisition evidence, full research report
- Competitors
Name Where Launched Scale How it differs from this one Archery Scoresheets(Appshay) iOS 2018 US store rating 562 Scores strictly by ring count; Bowken deliberately skips scoring and only shows dispersion ArcherySuccess – Score & Plot iOS 2017 293 ratings on the US store, paid at $14.99 Hit logging + dispersion analysis, covers everything Bowken does; one-time purchase, while Bowken uses consumable credits Rcherz.com(bowbook) iOS 2012 733 rating Competitions, community, ranking platform Rise – Archery Scoring Tracker iOS 2019 156 rating Scoring + statistics Ishi Archery Scoring iOS 2015 123 rating Scoring Falcon Eye / CapTarget / Simple Arrows / TenRing / Quiver and other long-tail apps iOS 2021–2026 0–28 ratings Similar small tools, no abnormal chart performance Ianseo Scorekeeper NG / Artemis iOS 2023 Official competition scoring Official tournament tool MyTargets Open source About 2014 Long-running open-source archery logger on Android Free and open source - Where users come from
- Confirmed small-country Top Grossing charts (low bar): about 0 ratings yet in Sports Top Grossing at sa #7 / il #8 / hr #8 / tr #10 (appstore library 11-05~06)
- Inferred concentrated off-store traffic (ads or the B-side's own channels): since 11-04, about 20 stores' Sports Top Free charts have featured it at once while ratings haven't moved; the AppInsider model estimates 15% of users pay
- Confirmed batch of developer accounts + shell companies: Bowken / Sovrin. / Trekly, all listed on 2026-10-25 with IDs 6820869129 / 6820873752 / 6820876045, three personal-name developers, publisher EOOD / Ltd
- Inferred hidden B-side monetization (A/B-side front app): the archery app self-reports 16+ with suggestive hints; a 1-star Saudi review says "contains sexual content"; the IAP names have nothing to do with the features, the top tier is SAR 349.99, applion shows the most expensive tier at ¥13,000 ranked #1 by sales; it only started charting 1.1.0 days after an update
- Inferred social / creators / press / ASO: nothing turns up on X, TikTok or the web; English only, no localization
Bowken (iOS 6820869129) research report
Research date 2026-11-06. Regions checked: all 115 appstore-library storefronts scanned first, then detail on sa / tr / il / hr / ae / jp / us.
Bottom line
Bowken looks like an archery practice log app, but it wasn't driven by archery users. Every piece of evidence points the same way: this is a batch-published A-side/B-side front app, with the archery log serving only as a shell for App Review. The chart signal comes from large in-app purchases (the most expensive tier sells best) with almost zero ratings, concentrated in Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Israel and the Gulf. Two other apps on the same template with adjacent App IDs were published the same day (Sovrin., Trekly), and earlier apps on the same template (Sharlo, Mixora) have already vanished from the App Store. It has no product strength worth borrowing. What you could borrow is the playbook of a vertical tool shell plus small-country Top Grossing charts, and that is exactly what Apple's new 2026-10-16 rules name for enforcement, in 2.5.19 clauses.
1. Basic data
| items | value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Developer | ANNAL ADZEL WESOLK (personal name; this is the only app under the account); publisher listed as "Bowken EOOD" (Bulgarian limited-company suffix) | iTunes lookup, App Store sa page |
| Launched | 2026-10-25 release on 1.0.0; 2026-11-03 release on 1.1.0, with boilerplate notes like "1.Optimized list loading logic… 2.Fixed color display deviation…" | iTunes lookup |
| Bundle ID | com.Bowken.saq | appstore library, app table |
| Rating | US store 16+/17+, "Infrequent/Mild Mature/Suggestive Themes". The archery log app itself declares "mature / suggestive content" | iTunes lookup, App Store us page |
| Language | English only | lookup |
| Privacy policy | bladen.shop/k7m2p9qxw (random path, the domain is unrelated to the product); the privacy label says it collects User ID / Device ID / usage data and links it to identity | App Store page, privacy page read via Jina |
| Rating | 3 worldwide (sa 1, 1 stars; tr 2), US 0 | appstore library app_day 2026-11-06 |
| Only review | sa, 2026-11-03,1 stars: "تطبيق غير لائق بالمجتمع / يوجد محتوى جنسي" (inappropriate for society / contains sexual content) | appstore library review table |
In-app purchases (Saudi App Store page, 2026-11-06)
Bowken Steal Tag 01–07, Core Tag 04/07/08, priced SAR 4.99 → 349.99 (US top $79.99, Japan ¥13,000). The description mentions only one consumable: making one Round Review costs 30 "Range Credits". To pay for one archery review page it offers 10 tiers, the top one at SAR 349.99, and the IAP names (Steal Tag / Core Tag) have nothing to do with the feature.
Which tier sells best:
- applion.jp (Japan store): 1 buyers of Steal Tag 07 (¥13,000), 2 buyers of Steal Tag 04 (¥2,000), 3 buyers of Steal Tag 02 (¥300). applion.jp/Bowken/iphone-6820869129/
- AppInsider (US store): 1 Steal Tag 03, 2 Core Tag 02, 3 Steal Tag 07. appinsider.io/app/bowken-6820869129
An archery log app with only 3 ratings, where the most expensive tier sells best. This doesn't look like archery enthusiasts spending money. It looks more like the coin-top-up spending pattern of social / live-streaming apps (inferred).
2. Chart trajectory (appstore library app_day)
- The 2026-10-28 library started collecting and runs through 11-03. Bowken never appeared on any chart in 115 storefronts (the first app_day entry is 11-04).
- 11-03 launched 1.1.0 → 11-04 charted in 10 stores → 11-05 29 stores → 11-06 30 stores. AppInsider's first recorded appearance was 11-04 on the Saudi Sports Top Free chart, #3.
- Best positions: Sports Top Grossing sa #7 (11-05), il #8, hr #8, tr #10, om #14, kw #19, ae #19, jp #35/38, ca #100; also on Sports Top Free in about 20 other stores including ee, cy, bh, kw, no, sk and qa (ranked 18–190).
- New ratings over the last three days: 11-04 0, 11-05 0, 11-06 +3.
Reading: 20 Sports Top Free charts in several stores at the same time while ratings don't move means a batch of installs arrived together, not the shape of organic store search. The Top Grossing signal is concentrated in the Middle East, Turkey and Israel, where the Sports top-grossing bar is low, so a few big IAPs get you into the top 10. The charting timing follows 1.1.0 updates, matching the rhythm of "approved, now open the B side." This is inferred: we can't see what's inside the app.
3. Sibling apps from the same batch (the most important finding in this report)
| App | App ID | Developer name | Launched | Template traits | Landscape |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bowken (archery log) | 6820869129 | ANNAL ADZEL WESOLK / © Bowken EOOD | 2026-10-25 | Steal/Core Tag IAPs, 16+ suggestive content | Live, charting in 30 stores |
| Sovrin.(Travel) | 6820873752 (about 4,600 away from Bowken) | RASMUS KASK | 2026-10-25 | Name includes punctuation; Travel Top Grossing ke #3, il #11, tr, vn, pk… 16 stores | US store page is 404 (read via 2026-11-06 Jina) |
| Trekly, (travel footprint log) | 6820876045 | Max Parker / © Trekly Ltd | 2026-10-25 | 16+ "Mature or Suggestive Themes"; in-app purchases "Trekly Mass Value 01–06 / Published Value 03–09", ₺99.99–3,999.99 | Live, charted in Travel Top Grossing: jo #9, qa #10, sa #11, tr #14,24 |
| Sharlo (fashion editor outfit log) | 6798536208 | Not found | About 2026-08 | Sharlo Steal Tag 01–05 / Core Tag 08–12, top $129.99 | Store pages 404, now removed |
| Mixora (gear maintenance log) | 6791102732 | Lisa Henrich / © Mixora Inc. | About 2026-08 | Mixora Steal Tag 03–07 / Core Tag 11–12 | Store pages 404, now removed |
Data sources: appstore library app_profile (all stores), App Store pages (Jina), Exa / Jina search results for "Steal Tag" / "Core Tag". Sharlo and Mixora are not in our library, which means they never hit the charts we scraped, and they're already gone from the long-tail snapshots.
What they have in common:
- All are "private log" micro-niche utilities (archery, outfits, gear maintenance, travel footprints) with the same descriptive tone;
- Each app has a "person name" developer account, with a different shell company (EOOD / Ltd / Inc) as the copyright holder;
- In-app purchase names follow "<App name> + two random words + number", with the same price ladder;
- Utility apps self-report 16+ with suggestive content;
- Top-grossing signals cluster in the Gulf states, Turkey, Israel and Japan, with ratings ≈ 0;
- Short-lived: the August batch is already delisted, 10-25 of this batch, Sovrin, is delisted in the US store.
This is what Chinese dev circles call the "A/B side shell package": the A side (the shell) goes to Apple for review, and after approval a remote switch shows users the B side (refs: www.cnblogs.com/zfjcode/p/17089525.html, zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/661390942). We did not install the apps and cannot see what the B side is. Judging from the Saudi review complaining about "sexual content", the self-declared 16+ suggestive content, and the high-priced top-up tiers topping the grossing charts, the most likely category is paid social / video chat / adult content (inference, unverified).
4. Growth tactics
| Channel | Evidence | Confirmed? |
|---|---|---|
| Small-country Sports category top-grossing exposure | sa #7, il #8, hr #8, tr #10, rating ≈ 0 (appstore library) | Confirmed (chart) |
| Off-store traffic (ads or the B side's own channels) funnels installs in | Within 11-04 of launch, about 20 stores charted in Sports Top Free at once, with ratings not rising; the AppInsider model estimates 15% of installs come from paid ads (model estimate only) | Unconfirmed |
| Bulk developer accounts + shell companies to spread risk | Three apps listed the same day, adjacent IDs, three person-name developers | Confirmed (data) |
| Store search / ASO | English only, no localization, the title is just "Bowken", essentially no reliance on search | Ruled out |
| Social / creators / media | X (x-radar 30 days, 0 posts), TikTok (a TikHub search for "Bowken" returned nothing relevant), Brave web search: none of them | Confirmed: none |
Where the money comes from: B-side users buy high-priced consumable in-app purchases (Apple takes 15–30%). Archery users are unlikely to buy Round Review credits (inference).
5. Competitors (doing "archery logging / scoring")
| Product | Where | Launched | Scale | How they differ from Bowken |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Archery Scoresheets(Appshay) | iOS | 2018 | US store rating 562 | Proper scoring sheets, WA / AGB rules; Bowken deliberately "doesn't count rings" |
| ArcherySuccess – Score & Plot | iOS / Android | 2017 | 293 ratings on the US store, paid at $14.99 | Shot placement + dispersion analysis, a superset of Bowken's features |
| Rcherz.com(bowbook) | iOS / web | 2012 | 733 rating | Competitions, community, rankings |
| Rise – Archery Scoring Tracker | iOS | 2019 | 156 rating | Scoring + statistics |
| Archery Scoring – Ishi Archery | iOS | 2015 | 123 rating | Scoring |
| Falcon Eye, CapTarget, Easy3DScore, Simple Arrows, TenRing, Quiver, etc. | iOS | 2021–2026 | 0–28 ratings | Same long-tail category, with new entrants still appearing every 2026 years |
| Ianseo Scorekeeper NG / Artemis | iOS / open source | 2023 | Official competition scoring | Official tournament tool |
| MyTargets | Android open source | Around 2014 | A long-running open-source archery logger | Free and open source |
| AppInsider's "similar apps" | iOS | — | — | Apple lists Bowken alongside ArcheryLink, Archery Score Tracker, AimTrack and others (2026-11-06) |
Sources: iTunes Search API (US store, 2026-11-06, run from macmini), AppInsider.
Conclusion: archery logging is an old niche that people have long since built, and a very small one, with the top apps only a few hundred ratings. Bowken's features (shot logging, dispersion view, sight notes) are a subset of these products, so features alone could never win charts in 30 stores.
6. Visibility and copycats
- Revenue is not public, with no media coverage, and no discussion on X, TikTok or the web; only automated aggregator pages like applion and AppInsider. → "Not yet widely known."
- Copycats: no one is seen copying it. It was itself mass-produced from a template (Sovrin., Trekly, and earlier Sharlo and Mixora).
7. Timing and risk
- 2026-10-16 Apple added 2.5.19: apps that turn into something else after approval (bait-and-switch) get pulled and the developer account banned; Apple also said it banned 193k fraudulent developer accounts in 2025 years (https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=vvzx6cul; analysis medium.com/@andy.a.g/apple-added-two-app-review-rules-on-oct…).
- This batch's lifespan is likely measured in weeks: Sharlo and Mixora are already removed, and Sovrin. has been pulled from the US store as of 404.
8. What others can learn from it (and what not to copy)
- The only transferable lesson is observational: small-country category top-grossing charts (Gulf, Turkey, Israel, Croatia) have a very low bar, and a few large in-app purchases can reach the top 10. So when a model sees "recently launched, rating ≈ 0, top 20 in several stores' category grossing charts", it should first suspect a shell package, not product strength. These can become filter features: utility apps self-reporting 16+ suggestive content; IAP names in the form "<name> + random word + number"; privacy policy hosted on an unrelated domain at a random path; person-name developer with a company copyright holder.
- The tactic itself violates 2.5.19, accounts get banned, and we don't recommend copying it.
9. What's uncertain
- The B-side content (we didn't install the app, so we can't see it), and whether there's a remote switch: currently inferred from ratings, reviews, IAP format and same-batch removals.
- Where installs come from (Meta / TikTok / Google ad libraries don't track this product; the AppInsider 15% paid figure is only a model estimate).
- Real revenue: can only be inferred from the "most expensive tier topping the charts" and rankings, implying a few large IAP purchases per day.
- Who runs it: EOOD / Ltd / Inc are all shells; the release-note style reads like a Chinese team, but that is only an inference.
- How many of these apps remain: searching "Steal Tag / Core Tag / Mass Value / Published Value" turns up the ones above, and there may be more using other naming.
Source summary
- App Store: apps.apple.com/us/app/id6820869129, apps.apple.com/sa/app/bowken/id6820869129, apps.apple.com/tr/app/id6820876045 (Trekly), apps.apple.com/us/app/id6820873752 (Sovrin., 404), apps.apple.com/ca/app/sharlo/id6798536208 (404), apps.apple.com/gh/app/mixora/id6791102732 (404)
- Privacy policy: bladen.shop/k7m2p9qxw
- Third-party listings: applion.jp/Bowken/iphone-6820869129/ and appinsider.io/app/bowken-6820869129
- App Store library (agent-im server, DuckDB): app_day, app_profile, app, review, 2026-11-04~11-06
- Apple policy: developer.apple.com/news/?id=vvzx6cul