Stephen Shankland/CNET

Google is relegating poorly behaved Android apps to obscurity, making it harder for you to find them when you're searching the Google Play Store.

"We recently enhanced our search and discovery algorithms to reflect app quality," Google Play Product Manager Andrew Ahn said in a blog post Thursday. "This results in higher quality apps being surfaced in the Play Store more than similar apps of lower quality (e.g. apps that exhibit more frequent crashes)."

Ahn offers some tips to programmers on making their apps snappy, easy on batteries and more stable. If you're frustrated, though, take heart that Google is watching who's getting the one-star ratings.