One of our most common questions is the criteria used when adding new products to our catalog or building new features. In this article, I want to review the process myself (Justin Chalfant, Founder) and our engineering team use when evaluating pending feature and application requests on our UserVoice.
The Basics: We Don’t Know What We Don’t Know
The first step in the process is to ensure we know what new application you would like to see added to our supported products or what feature would provide you value. Our goal is not to have the largest update catalog in the industry for promotional purposes. Instead, our goal is to have a list of supported products that provides our customers with the most value.
If you have a new application or feature request, the first step is to submit a new feature request on our UserVoice-style Ideas Portal (https://ideas.patchmypc.com/). If you don’t submit it here, it’s unlikely your idea will ever be implemented into our product.
Before submitting a new request, you can search for the application or feature you would like to see added.
If you see an existing feature matching your request, you should up-vote it rather than submitting a new idea. After subscribing to an existing idea, you will receive an email notification when there are any status updates.
Application Requests
For Application requests, use the Application Requests dropdown to search for the application you’d like to see added. This ensures you’re searching within the correct application catalog and avoids duplicate requests.
Feature Requests
For Feature requests, select the appropriate Component Area under Feature Requests (Product) before searching or submitting your request. Choosing the correct Component Area ensures your request is routed to the right Patch My PC product area
How Does Patch My PC Prioritize New Application Requests?
There are multiple factors we take into account when working through the submitted application requests. One of the biggest factors we start with when working through our queue is how many unique customers have subscribed to a specific application request.
The number of unique subscribers does not necessarily mean the largest number of votes. For example, an idea with 10 votes with subscribers from 8 different companies would likely be prioritized over an idea with 25 votes but only subscribers from 3 different companies. This is why the most important step is to submit your application request if it’s not already in our UserVoice.
Once we determine there is a product that would benefit multiple customers, the next factors that impact priority are:
- How complex is the installer?
- Does the installer have a public download?
- Is the installer digitally signed?
- Is the installer downloaded in EXE, MSI, or MSP format?
- Does the installer support silent installations?
- Can the installer reboot behaviour be controlled or suppressed?
- Does the installer support SYSTEM-level installations?
- Are there any custom-actions or scripts that need to be run?
We have these requirements because each new product added requires a large amount of up-front time and even more time to maintain all future updates.
Our goal is to add around 80 new products per month. In our Public Roadmap, you can see the recent applications that shipped. Shipped application requests will use the “New Products” dark blue tag.
How Does Patch My PC Prioritize New Feature Requests for our product?
The prioritization of new feature requests for our product is very different from prioritizing new application requests. The reason for this is simple. For applications, we know the following:
- The upfront engineering time will be about 8+ hours.
- Maintaining an application that updates often can be well over 40+ engineering hours per year.
Since the engineering time can often vary, our criteria for adding features are less based on the number of unique customers and more based on the value we think the request could provide. For example, when filtering by shipped feature request for the publisher, you will see many features shipped with only 1 vote:
Oftentimes, these lower voted for ideas that are easier to implement from an engineering perspective may ship in a few weeks. However, there are often complex feature requests that may take many subscribers before it’s implemented. For example, the feature request to add support for Microsoft Intune took about 1-year to implement because it was difficult and took a massive amount of engineering time.
What Does Each Status Mean in the UserVoice Portal?
Each idea submitted will have a status associated with it. The status will help you know at what point in the process the idea is in.
Below is an overview of how we define status for application and feature requests:
Submitted — Submitted is the default status assigned to every new idea.
Noted — We use Noted to acknowledge that this has been requested and has had initial review. This is a new state that we’ve added in April 2026 and as we move forward reviewing items filed after that date, will help inform submitters know that their ideas have been proactively reviewed.
Under Consideration — We use this status when we’ve added this on our Engineering Backlog to discuss further internally and consider in more depth.
Clarification Needed — We need more details from the person who submitted the request in the comments section to understand the request better.
Planned (Used for Application Requests) — We intend to implement support for this Application in the future, but we haven’t necessarily actively started coding it yet and ETA may not necessarily be shared.
In Development (or “Started” for Application Requests) — It means our engineering team is actively coding the feature. It’s started!
Private Preview — The feature is available in private preview to specific customers and is undergoing internal testing.
Public Preview — The feature is available in the latest preview build. For Publisher related features, these can be enabled in the About tab of the Publisher.
Will Not Implement (or “No Go” for Application Requests) — We have chosen not to implement the Feature at this time.
Shipped — The feature is generally available in the latest production build, such as the Publisher, catalog, cloud offering, etc.
Takeaway: Please Submit Your Feedback on UserVoice
If you didn’t get this take away from the points above already, please submit any new application or feature request at https://ideas.patchmypc.com/.