RockAuto

RockAuto for Android is what happens when someone decides a mobile web browser isn't enough of an inconvenience and makes an app that's basically the full site inside a wrapper. Imagine looking for a water pump gasket on your phone, trying to read microscopic part diagrams that were clearly drawn for 24-inch monitors, or worse yet ordering three alternators entirely by mistake because the "Add to Cart" button is too small to hit accurately. RockAuto's app takes their famously austere website and manages to make it even harder to use by disguising itself as native software while offering none of the benefits.

The Non-App App Experience

"A mess to navigate," say users, others purely stating "This is not a real app for me" – a brutal verdict over the fundamental deceit at play. It's basically a browser within an app directed to RockAuto on the big screen, no mobile optimization is available for it, you don't get any offline mode option or permanently saved vehicle profiles and of course you won't find a barcode scanner or VIN decoder like actual auto parts apps have. The interface shows the full desktop catalog with 1999-era design philosophy intact: minuscule text, microscopic checkboxes, dropdown menus that are nearly impossible to use on a touchscreen unless you have surgeon-level precision. If you rotate your phone, the app crashes every single time. Not only that but if you touch the back button once you are sent all the way out to start over and re-enter everything about your vehicle. This isn't a bug—just the natural result of trying to cram a website never intended for mobile in the first place. The search requires entering whole part numbers or going through those year/make/model/engine dropdowns no one adjusted for fat fingers on 6-inch screens. Images won't zoom correctly, compatibility charts fall off the screen and a process that should take two minutes takes 10 because you lose focus on random form fields.

The Fake App Scandal

It gets weirder: RockAuto in an email from May 2, 2024 stated "Beware of Apps! We were a bit taken aback when we read about irritating ads in the rockauto iPhone app. RockAuto has no app!" The company says outright that they concentrate on being a good experience for browsers, not apps. But several "RockAuto" apps are available in both the Google Play and Apple's App Store, built by third-party developers wrapping the website without permission. RockAuto learned that someone had put an app in the Apple App Store using their logo and company information — along with misspellings and amateurish graphics you'd expect from a phishing operation. A fake app which calls itself "RackAuto" in its description, includes truck photos with merely the word "Heading" printed upon them as if inserted from a missing template, and was reported by RockAuto on April 18, 2024 to Apple via their Online Service Provider reporting forms accompanied by trademark registration details and DMCA takedown notices but Apple not only refused to remove it but featured it among incorrect search results when the company name is searched.

Technical Architecture of Neglect

The Android variant, with its merely a couple of permission requests for internet and network state, bears testimony to this fact. No camera permission to scan VINs, no storage access to store vehicle profiles, no location services for locating nearby warehouses. The 10MB download is basically a crippled Chrome with its start page locked to RockAuto.com, adding overhead without functionality. Because nothing is cached locally, load times are a slave to the speed of mobile data — rural mechanics checking part compatibility will spend ages in loading screens. The app offers parts from more than 300 manufacturers (it's organized alphabetically, from Abarth to Zundapp), but this extensive catalog is in a mobile wrapper that makes you feel like you're reading an encyclopedia through a keyhole. And the disastrous shipping calculator on the desktop site — which processes orders that are spread across multiple warehouses without telling you in advance this is happening — is even worse as it's difficult to see warehouse indicators on mobile devices.

Why This Exists at All

The wrapper apps do not seem to come from RockAuto — but rather affiliate marketers or third parties trying to get some mobile traffic. It's likely these developers gain commission from RockAuto's affiliate program for shunting users through their wrapped browser. The reason they won't develop a proper app is the site is kept as lean and mean, running a bare-bones website for budget-conscious mechanics and DIY enthusiasts who want parts at rock bottom prices as their business model. RockAuto is an online-only commercial establishment with no storefront locations and not equipped to take phone calls for the most part. This minimalist ethos even applies to their mobile strategy—or, rather, the absence of one. Amazon, eBay and even more traditional parts stores have slick apps with barcode scanners and garage features and installation videos, but RockAuto delivers the same HTML that it did in 1999 to any device.

Who This Serves (Nobody)

The app is bad for every potential user: pros trying to look up parts will never use such a poor experience mid-repair with greasy gloves; DIYers want to sit on the couch and browse, but can't read the terrible spec pages; customers need to place a huge order but items fall out of cart and navigation becomes impossible on small screens. Rural folks with weak cell signal will find this all unusable while standing next to their old Toyota, knowing they're about to drive to town just to verify a part would really fix their problem. Even RockAuto's most dedicated customers — the ones willing to ignore the company's occasionally baffling website in return for its low prices — are getting nothing from the app wrapper. Customer comments suggest the company is making mistakes by failing to ship the correct parts, including some missing altogether, and taking phone calls nowhere while shipping out orders late. The app wrapper only increases this mess by taking away the ability to check an order on a small screen. RockAuto's mobile "app" is the worst of both worlds: a desktop site in some reverse-engineered pretend-native wrapper that adds overhead and doesn't actually remove any of the original friction, built by shadowy third-party actors that RockAuto itself warns about, but nonetheless available for download by unwary users who just want to find brake pads for their 2003 Camry without squinting at tiny part numbers on their phone.