Uploading Android App Bundle to Google Play Console - key signing error

I'm trying to upload a brand new .aab file to the Google Play Console, but keep getting this error:

Upload failed
You uploaded an APK or Android App Bundle that is signed with a key that is also used to sign APKs that are delivered to users. Because you are enrolled in App Signing by Google Play, you should sign your APK or Android App Bundle with a new key before you upload it.

I'm completely stumped, as I generated a new key for this app bundle at the time of generating the app bundle, i.e. through the Build > Generate Signed Bundle / APK... menu item in Android Studio, so it is a brand new key, unused by other apps.
I've even tried creating a whole new keystore with a new key in it, but always get the same error. Is this some quirk someone else has come across?

When enrolling for App Signing by Google Play for this app, I chose the "Let Google manage and protect your app signing key (recommended)" option, and from all the documentation I've read, the key that you use to sign the app with first becomes the "Upload Key", so it seems like I'm doing everything correctly, but no dice.

Does anyone have any advice, or past experience on this?


I am facing the same issues, in my case signingConfig was setup, I made one simple mistake, that I forget to change app debuggable to false. so even though I generated from menu or from gradle command, build was successfully generated but it was debuggable so play store not accepting signed apk and give me and message like Upload Failed The Android Bundle was not Signed in .


make sure to change app debuggable to false in build.gradle file

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Well, after a lot of screaming and shouting, including reaching out to Google Play Console support in chat (they're only first level support, so... not much help) and email (who put me in the too hard basket and said they can't offer support for app development - what? the problem is to do with uploading an app to Play Console, not app dev!), I discovered this self answered question https://stackoverflow.com/a/54359729/845205.

Basically, make sure you're doing a Clean & Rebuild Project whenever doing anything to do with signing in Android Studio. For some reason it thought my new app was using the key from my old app and kept signing with that. (I guess the solution was app development support after all!)