We recently received feedback under Guideline 4.3(b) suggesting our app duplicates functionality found in other apps in this category. However, our app is fundamentally not a dating app. It is a conversation facilitator designed to foster meaningful connections for friendships, networking, and shared interests. While romantic connections may occur naturally, they are not the primary focus. Thus, we are seeking insights on this key question: How do developers effectively demonstrate feature differentiation to reviewers? We want to clearly show how our app’s functionality uniquely addresses user needs and provides value beyond existing solutions. Our Core Features: Our app introduces distinct features that differentiate it from traditional apps in this space: Paths: Psychology-based prompts embedded in chats encourage users to explore meaningful topics like values and aspirations. These prompts are dynamically triggered to keep conversations engaging and productive. Aura: A rewards system that incentivizes thoughtful, high-quality engagement by awarding points for meaningful conversations, which can unlock additional features. Spark Matches: Real-time, themed events pair users for structured, 15-minute conversations on topics like technology or travel. Curated prompts ensure the focus is on shared interests, not romance. Flame Matches: AI-personalized matches adapt to user conversations, connecting individuals based on compatibility. Chats begin anonymously, focusing on personalities rather than appearances, and are designed for platonic, professional, or friendship connections. Market Analysis: Our app addresses key gaps in the connection space: No apps embed conversation prompts directly into chats; nor do they trigger them regularly or dynamically, to foster deeper discussions over a sustained period. No apps have rewards systems designed to specifically incentivize meaningful engagement. No apps have matchmaking systems that adapt dynamically based on users’ past conversations. No apps support the combination of real-time, one-on-one themed conversations with curated prompts. Traction: As an incorporated business with over a year of experience, we have helped thousands of users build platonic, professional, and interest-based connections. For example, users in relationships join our events to find new friends, and professionals use Spark Matches to discuss shared interests like technology. Consistent feedback highlights our prompts and structured events as refreshing alternatives to superficial, appearance-driven platforms. Our rapidly growing user base has validated the demand for these features, and we would like to bring this experience natively to them via a mobile app on the App Store. Additional Context: While some basic chat functionality may overlap with existing platforms, our focus is on facilitating meaningful conversations and incentivizing a thoughtful conversation culture that represents a novel approach validated by user research and feedback. We welcome advice from developers who have successfully highlighted their app’s uniqueness when facing similar review challenges. Thank you in advance! :)

Seeking developer insights regarding a 4.3(a) review response citing "similar binary, metadata, and/or concept." Our app implements distinct community-focused features that fundamentally differentiate it from existing applications in this category. Feature Implementation: Our app introduces new technological approaches to faith-based applications: Community System: Custom-built group participation with progress visualization Engagement Features: Peer support system with achievement tracking Progress Metrics: Proprietary points system for progress tracking Group Progress Features: Shared accomplishment tracking Achievement Architecture: Progress continuity tracking Performance metrics accumulation Custom recognition system for personal and group milestones Synchronized goal-setting framework Market Analysis: Our research indicates: No existing apps with group-based progress features No solutions combining community features with scheduling No applications with similar group achievement systems No platforms featuring synchronized progress tracking Substantial user base requesting these features Technical Questions: How have developers effectively demonstrated feature differentiation? What technical documentation best demonstrates unique implementations? What strategies work for showing market demand for new features? Best practices for documenting novel community features? Implementation Context: While core scheduling features necessarily overlap with existing solutions, our platform's focus on community engagement and achievement tracking represents a novel approach, validated through user research and community feedback. Seeking insights from developers who have successfully implemented unique social features in established categories.

I recently got feedback for my app under Guideline 4.2 - Design - Minimum Functionality, and I’m a bit confused. Apple mentioned that the app isn’t “app-like” enough and doesn’t provide sufficient entertainment value or utility. However, I genuinely think my app is unique compared to others on the market. Most similar apps only offer basic features like scorekeeping and saving the game. My app goes beyond that by tracking detailed statistics based on the types of scores achieved during the game. At the end, there’s even a Player Ratings section, which enhances competition and makes the experience more fun for players. Additionally, in today’s gaming scene, many groups play the traditional 101 game with a reward and penalty system. My app uniquely incorporates a reward system, something no other app in the market currently offers. I believe my app has the potential to stand out and meet the needs of a wide audience. Has anyone faced similar feedback? Or does anyone have suggestions on how I could better address this issue? Thanks in advance! 😊

Hello, I am experiencing a problem where I am unable to build my app using the command - npx eas build --platform ios --profile development, although I have Admin rights in my team in the AppStore Connect. I read that here - https://forums.developer.apple.com/forums/thread/737541 someone already experience the same issue and it was resolved after reporting on the forum, so that's what i decided to do as well. I am attaching few screenshots as well. Thanks!

Hello everyone, I’m developing an alarm app in Swift 5, and I’m running into an issue with playing custom alarm sounds. Here’s the setup: I’m using AVAudioPlayer to play a custom sound when the alarm goes off. I’m triggering the alarm through a local notification, which works perfectly while the app is in the foreground. However, when the app is in the background or the screen is locked, the custom alarm sound doesn’t play. I’ve looked at other apps on the App Store, like Alarmy, which seem to play alarms even when the iPhone is locked or the app is in the background. I’m trying to achieve similar functionality but haven’t been successful. If anyone has experience with creating alarm apps or has a workaround for playing sounds in the background/lock screen, I’d really appreciate your insights. Are there specific permissions or settings I need to enable, or a different approach to handling sound playback? Thank you so much in advance for your help!

I received the follow error result and based on my research, it seems that it may be a false positive. Web3podium Version 1.0.8 Build 45 Please correct the following issues and upload a new binary to App Store Connect. ITMS-90338: Non-public API usage - The app references non-public selectors in Frameworks/JitsiMeetSDK.framework/JitsiMeetSDK: initWithURLStrings:. If method names in your source code match the private Apple APIs listed above, altering your method names will help prevent this app from being flagged in future submissions. In addition, note that one or more of the above APIs may be located in a static library that was included with your app. If so, they must be removed. For further information, visit the Technical Support Information at http://developer.apple.com/support/technical/ ITMS-90683: Missing purpose string in Info.plist - Your app’s code references one or more APIs that access sensitive user data, or the app has one or more entitlements that permit such access. The Info.plist file for the “Runner.app” bundle should contain a NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription key with a user-facing purpose string explaining clearly and completely why your app needs the data. If you’re using external libraries or SDKs, they may reference APIs that require a purpose string. While your app might not use these APIs, a purpose string is still required. For details, visit: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/protecting_the_user_s_privacy/requesting_access_to_protected_resources. This false positive perspective is based on looking to this issue online and looking at the existing Jitsi Meet implementations. We would appreciate guidance and direction for this pretty large and significant open source repository being leveraged. https://github.com/jitsi/jitsi-meet/issues/8624#issuecomment-781361671

Sir/Maam, I want to tell you to personally meet me at Apple Saket Citywalk Mall, as I am from India Uttar Pradesh Noida or my nearest Apple authorized store is in Saket. Your request is, please meet me. In Delhi Apple store, please provide it to me in person because I want to explain my iOS app or share its features or I want to sell my app to apple developers.... Thank you team!! Yours faithfully Akansha

Greetings, We have been rejected in the review of our App for a code non-compliance with 4.3 Design guidelines. Our App appears to be similar to others, and indeed it is similar in functionality and appearance. The others that are similar have been developed by us as well, these being customisations that are specifically targeted at the companies or accounts we deal with. The truth is that we have gone through several reviews of the other Apps before when we submitted them for publication at the time. We know that there are other development companies that customise Apps for different brands and in these cases there has been no reason for rejection by the Apple Store. We are beginning to think that there may be certain factors that are directly influencing the rejection of this App: The mockups or screenshots we are using are similar to those of another App we have published with the same functionalities. The backgrounds of the App have a gem of colours similar to that of the other App. And now we wonder: Is it possible that he rejected it solely because of design issues with the presentation screenshots and backgrounds of the App? Apart from the appeal that can be submitted to the Store via the review form, is there any way to contact Apple by phone to determine exactly why the App was rejected? How do other companies upload the same custom App and get it reviewed?

Hi, I already distributed private app for my company, but I stuck with the big problem that I cannot solve. I distributed private app through generate redeem link to the employee and the problem is how to generate link to update app directly ? I try all normal link but cannot link to private app. Some link alert Not available in your country but the country of the app is all the same. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/app-name/app-id itms-apps://itunes.apple.com/th/app/app-name/app-id Thank you for your help.

ExampleCode.txt Dear all, I made an app for computing Finite Element Analysis of electric motors. I (think I) managed to follow the MVVM principle by not exposing the model to the views. Now, my goal is to be able to use documents, each representing a different motor. I want to have my files saved on iCloud, and I want to be able to read plain text from it, so some other code (i.e. python) can create new configurations, even though this app is made for building, graphically. Before trying to work with FileDocument, my class ViewModel: ObservableObject had properties with Published, like @Published var staOD = 80.0, and I would have views with TextFields to change these values. Now, I’m trying to blend in FileDocument, and I’m lost. I don’t know how I should work with my data. Under the “Separation of Concerns”, I guessed that: ViewModel: Should handle computations, updates, and application logic. Document: Should focus on data persistence and encapsulate data to be saved/loaded as a document. My ViewModel looks a bit strange to me, and I’m not sure I’m updating it the right way. I have around 100 parameters, I’m afraid I’m updating these parameters too often and unnecessarily every parameter at the same time, even when only one value is changed in the document. What I’m asking: Clarifications on how to work with FileDocument in my case of MVVM (I’m open to change the entire workflow, my main knowledge is on the Model built in Swift, but not SwiftUI) Why isn’t the computed area on the DocumentView at the right value when I open a document? I would like to open documents and have it in the “right” state. In reality, I’m computing an image of the electric motor, and it would be nice to open the document and see the “real” image, and not a dummy image before I can validate the geometry. I have these warnings popping every time I open a document and that scares me, especially because I want ideally to use swift 6 in the coming future, with concurrency the right way. Publishing changes from background threads is not allowed; make sure to publish values from the main thread (via operators like receive(on:)) on model updates. Thanks a lot for your help, Guillaume I made an example/simplified code that has all the logic. I can't show the entire code in this prompt due to space limitation. Therefore, I put everything (184 lines) in a single Swift file for you to download. You can just create a Multiplatform Document App. Remove all files except the ...App file, in which you can paste the content of the shared swift file. Run on iPhone simulator. Development environment: Xcode 16, macOS 15 Run-time configuration: iOS 18, macOS 15 Open the app, click on "New motor" You will see "Computed area: 3'063..." Click on "Geometry", change "Stator OD" to 60 instead of 80. Click on "Save" button, now Computed area is 863... Click on "Cancel" button, and reopen the same document Problem: area is again 3'063 while when you open Geometry, you see that "Stator OD" is rightfully 60.

I am new. I have never used Swift nor XCode or the CLI. But I have found and managed to test my App that I created for testing on my iPhone. I have absolutely no intentions to put it on the App Store. I even made it Open-Source on GitHub. I learned a lot of things and ways to prevent crashes, but unfortunately I am slowly starting to lose the ability to put my App on my iOS. I am new here as a developer. But I have troubles to create a Developer Account, so I am not sure what I should do. Here's what I think I am having issues with: I feel like you can only create a Developer Account if you have a business, is this true? I really find it cool to test my own App on my own phone. But I want to do it in an official way. But I don't know how. Others have told me that you'd need a License for the App Store. But I am not trying to put it on the App Store, will this make it impossible for me to test my own app? Why make an app if not putting it on the App Store? You can learn. If you make good Apps or Libraries, you can provide them to other Developers! Maybe even an opportunity to collab with someone and even indeed put it on the App Store with a valid Developer Account. Seriously, if I wouldn't have been able to test my iOS app through other ways on my iPhone, I'd have never been able to make a short breakdown about AVAudioEngine and AVAudioSession. I've seen people that have run into these crashes. I tried to look up for a fix, but found none. I saw apps that allowed you to use a Microphone on a Laptop/PC and I decided to make my own one to test, and succeded, while I yet need to figure out a few crashes, I managed to do it, and I really want to continue and actually use my own App... So I was really happy that I could make a post to provide a guide in hopes that it would help someone. And I would do more, but I really need help with figuring out how I can test my own app on my own phone. I hope that Developer Relations can help with this.

I am honored that I successfully participated in the "Envision the future: Build great apps for visionOS"(https://developer.apple.com/events/view/ZCH7ZUY24C/dashboard) conference. However, unfortunately, I am in China, and due to the visa problem (because it usually takes at least 2 months to apply for a visa, but it only takes about 10 days from the time I received the notice to the meeting), I can't go to the United States to participate in the site. So I hope Apple can place an iPad on site and create a FaceTime link, and then I can make a call to this iPad. I also told Apple about this suggestion, but now there are only a few days left to start. They didn't reply to me. Even Apple has sent me the ticket to the Developer Center and asked me to add it to the Apple Wallet App, which means that Apple has not There is a request to deal with me. So I hope you can give me some advice or help me for those who know about this aspect. For Apple's internal engineers, if possible, I hope you can contact the person who manages this meeting. I'm very grateful for this. Thank you.

Hello all, Recently I observed a strange behaviour on macOS. Some apps with UI, after you quit them (right click on the Dock, select Quit or select Quit from the menubar), the apps are not actually quitting immediately, but in a few seconds (including in Activity Monitor the apps are staying alive). Also, if you open the apps again fast, the same PID is kept. Not all apps do this, some of them, for example WhatsApp. I'm not referring to closing all windows, but explicitly quitting. This was not the case in the past. Is there any reason for this? Is some kind of optimisation I'm not aware of? The actual issue is that in a Swift developed app events like NSWorkspace.didLaunchApplicationNotification or NSWorkspace.didTerminateApplicationNotification are not triggered. Is there any way to tell if an app was closed, even if macOS still keeps it around for a few more seconds? Thank you.

Hey everyone, I’m in a bit of a bind and could really use some advice from the community. My team and I have developed an app that’s intended for both existing business partners and potential new partners. The idea is for current partners to access specific features while allowing new users to submit requests to become partners. Our target audience is across India, and public distribution via the App Store is crucial for our growth. Here’s the issue: Apple has repeatedly rejected our app, stating that it’s intended for a specific business or organization and should use business app distribution instead. I’ve explained that public availability is essential for onboarding new partners, and I’ve even provided examples of similar apps that are publicly available in the App Store. Despite all this, Apple continues to reject our app. I’m frustrated because there are other apps in the App Store with similar use cases that seem to have no trouble getting approved. I’ve tried everything—highlighting the importance of public distribution, comparing our app with existing ones—but nothing seems to work. So, I’m turning to you all for help: Has anyone else dealt with a similar issue? How did you get around it? Do you know of any specific strategies or wording that might help convince Apple to approve our app? Is there a chance we’re missing something crucial that could be causing these rejections? I’m open to any suggestions or advice you might have. It’s been a long road, and we’re just trying to get our app out there to help businesses grow. Thanks in advance for your help! APP Review Message: Guideline 3.2 - Business We still found in our review that your app is intended to be used by a specific business or organization, including partners, clients, or employees, but you've selected public distribution on the App Store in App Store Connect. Since the App Store is intended for apps with a public audience, we recommend reviewing the other distribution options available to you through your Apple Developer Program Account. Next Steps To resolve this issue, review the other distribution options available for apps designed for specific businesses or organizations and choose a distribution option that works for your app and users. You can review these app distribution options on Apple Developer.

Does anyone have experience withe the following error message? The source control operation failed because the file “***” could not be found. Make sure a valid file exists in the repository and try again. I have added the repos, I was able to push the first version of my project. Any changes throw this error message, the file names didn’t changed since the first push. Maybe someone know a fix for this issue. Greetings, Janik

Hi, I have an app that uses GPS, to locate you, then retrieves a unique ID and then shows you: Location Name Unique ID Latitude & Longitude As you move around, this information is updated within the apps UI. The UI is just a card, with no map and the user is unable to change what is displayed, without moving location. I am wanting to integrate with CarPlay, so the users don't need to touch their device while in a moving car. Am I able do the following within the CarPlay Guidelines?, Display the unique ID Update the ID as the car moves Record a distance between two unique ID's (as the car is moving via a "Start" & "Stop" button) When I look at the CarPlay developer documentation, there is no clear guide on what template to use. Navigation or POI. There is also limited guidance on CarPlay development, so any tips/advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks Hayden

Hello, I am having trouble distributing the internal app to the Apple Business Manager via the AppStore private distribution. == Steps to reproduce == Create a new app on AppStore Connect Set it as a private distribution and specify the organisation ID Submit the build to the review The app review is approved and "Ready to Distribute" On the distribution tab, it says "This app was removed from sale from the App Store. Go to Pricing and Availability to add it back to the App Store." Sign-in to the Apple Business Manager Enable the custom app in the Apple Business Manager settings Expected: 7-A. The app is listed under the Custom App Observed: 7-B. There is no app listed under the Custom App section == Questions == Is there any other steps for the successful private distribution? Does the organisation receive any email from the App Store Connect to accept the private distirubion? Is there any way to see the status of the custom app from the developer? Is there any Apple support contact I can confirm the status of the app? Thank you for your help in advance!

I'm developing a macOS application called Blurt, which aims to provide enhanced notification management in MacOS. The core functionality I'm trying to implement is the ability to intercept and display notifications from various applications in a custom interface. Current implementation: Using AppDelegate to handle application lifecycle Implemented UNUserNotificationCenterDelegate for handling notifications Created a custom NotificationService extension Challenges: Unable to intercept notifications from other applications System notifications are not being captured by our app What I've tried: Using DistributedNotificationCenter to observe system-wide notifications Implementing a Notification Service Extension Exploring NSWorkspace notifications Current roadblocks: Apple's sandboxing and security model seems to prevent direct access to other apps' notifications Unable to find a sanctioned API for system-wide notification interception Questions: Is there a recommended approach to creating a centralized notification management system within Apple's guidelines? Are there any specific system notifications or events we can legally subscribe to that might help achieve similar functionality? How do other notification management apps (if any exist) handle this limitation? Are there any upcoming APIs or features in macOS that might address this use case? I'm open to alternative approaches or pivoting the app's functionality if necessary. Any insights, suggestions, or resources would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your help!

Hello, I am a product designer trying to understand the UI design limitations of CarPlay. I am designing a scene where a CPTabBarTemplate will appear. From what I can read in the CarPlay development documentation, I understand that it should be possible to assign a custom icon for each tab with tabImage: UIImage?, if I am not mistaken. However, any reference I have found always uses SF Symbols, which makes me wonder if they can actually be customized. And on the other hand, if they are customizable, could any PNG be used for the tab that might compromise the driver's safety? Thank you in advance.

Hello, I am a product designer and I am currently working on a project that incorporates functionalities in CarPlay. Given the UI limitations that exist for app development with CarPlay, are there any pre-designed templates in Figma or any other resources that can be used to design the screens? This way, I can adhere to those templates knowing what the limits are. Thank you very much for your attention.