Category: Apple Developer News

Family Sharing helps people share access to eligible auto-renewable subscriptions with up to five iCloud family members across their Apple devices. You can enable Family Sharing for your subscriptions to grow your subscription business, encourage paid memberships, and improve subscriber retention. Learn how you can set up Family Sharing for your subscriptions and discover some of the benefits of opting into this feature.

Family Sharing for in-app purchases

How to enable Family Sharing for your subscriptions

You can turn on Family Sharing for your subscription in App Store Connect. You can enable this feature on a per-subscription basis, and support either new or existing subscriptions. Please note that once you enable Family Sharing for a subscription, you won’t be able to turn this feature off.

1. Go to App Store Connect.
2. From the My Apps section, select your app.
3. Select In-App Purchases and pick the Manage option.
4. Select the auto-renewable subscription you’d like to enable Family Sharing for.
5. Click or tap “Turn On.”

To verify the purchase and provide access to subscribers and their family, make sure to perform purchase validation. If you choose to offer Family Sharing as a higher level of service, be sure to rank this subscription in the same level as the individual subscription in App Store Connect so customers can upgrade if they wish.

Leveraging server to server receipt validation

Explore default sharing behavior

Whether a Family Sharing-enabled subscription is shared automatically with a purchaser’s family depends on their subscription sharing settings and whether the subscription was purchased before or after you enabled Family Sharing.

By default, customers are opted in to share eligible new subscriptions with their family, and they can go to the Manage Subscriptions page under their App Store account or Apple ID settings to opt out at any time. To ensure user privacy, existing subscriptions that were purchased before Family Sharing was enabled are not shared by default.

Subscribers who don’t share their subscription by default will receive a push notification from Apple that their subscription can be shared with their Family Sharing members. This notification links to the Manage Subscriptions page, where subscribers can choose to share the subscription with their family group.

Highlight Family Sharing subscriptions in your app

To help people make a selection that best fits their needs, there are several different ways you can merchandise Family Sharing within your app.

Promote Family Sharing pre-purchase. When crafting a signup screen for your subscription, we recommend highlighting that Family Sharing is an included benefit. If you offer multiple subscription options including a higher-priced option that includes Family Sharing, consider noting this on your signup screen along with the incremental cost increase, so customers can distinguish their options.

Highlight the feature for existing subscribers. As a reminder, even if a subscription supports Family Sharing, it may not be shared by default depending on someone’s subscription sharing settings and whether they purchased the subscription prior to Family Sharing being enabled in App Store Connect. You can remind subscribers of this functionality — for example, as part of onboarding for new purchasers, or for existing subscribers via an in-app message — in order to help build awareness and encourage sharing. Consider including instructions on how they can make sure they’ve turned on Family Sharing for your subscription.

Offer Family Sharing as an upgrade. You can display in-app messaging to existing individual subscribers to let them know a subscription with Family Sharing is available and encourage them to upgrade. This can help customers upgrade their subscription without leaving your app. Be sure you’ve ranked the updated subscriptions within the same subscription level in App Store Connect to provide a smooth upgrade path.

You might also indicate that Family Sharing is available by including it in the subscription’s display name. This makes it easy for people to distinguish if a subscription offers this functionality when viewing their subscription options and managing their subscription.

Build awareness with family members. You can provide custom messaging within your app depending on who purchased the subscription. Use ownershipType to identify whether you’re providing information to the purchaser or another family member. For example, during onboarding you might ask the purchaser to verify their Family Sharing settings as well as provide opportunities for them to share the app through a share extension.

Resources

Learn more about Family Sharing subscriptions

Learn more about designing subscriptions

Supporting Family Sharing in Your App

February 8, 2022

Connect with Apple experts through online sessions February 15 to March 29 to learn about the latest App Store features and get your questions answered. Find out how to create product pages that resonate best with the people you’d like to reach, provide great subscription experiences, distribute custom offer codes, and promote your in-app events. Register today if you’re a member of the Apple Developer Program.

View schedule

Throughout its history, Apple’s App Store has helped drive innovation in the Netherlands. Today, the iOS app economy supports over 184,000 Dutch jobs, and we have helped Dutch developers access markets and customers in 175 regions around the world through the App Store.

A key reason for this success is that users have come to trust the App Store as the safest and most secure way to purchase digital goods and services. Apple’s in-app purchase system, an integral part of our world-class commerce platform, offers people a private and secure user experience across apps and Apple devices, and makes it easy for them to manage their purchases and subscriptions.

A recent order from the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) will allow developers of dating apps on the Netherlands App Store to use alternate payment processing options. These changes will compromise the user experience, and create new threats to user privacy and data security. We have appealed the ACM’s decision. In the meantime, we are required to make the mandated changes and are providing further details today which satisfy our legal obligations in the Netherlands while helping to protect users from these increased risks.

Developers of dating apps who want to continue using Apple’s in-app purchase system, which we believe is the safest and most secure way for users to purchase digital goods and services, may do so and no further action is needed. Developers of dating apps on the Netherlands App Store who would like to offer an alternate payment method can complete a request for one of two optional entitlements. The entitlements provide the capability to sell services through a payment system other than Apple’s in-app purchase system.

Before considering using one of these entitlements, it’s important to understand that some App Store features that you may use won’t be available to your customers, in part because we cannot validate the security and safety of payments that take place outside of the App Store’s private and secure payment system. Because Apple will not be aware of purchases made using alternative methods, Apple will not be able to assist users with refunds, purchase history, subscription management, and other issues encountered when purchasing digital goods and services through these alternative purchasing methods. You will be responsible for addressing such issues with customers.

If you’re interested in using one of these entitlements with your dating app distributed in the Netherlands, we’ve provided more information on requesting the entitlement, usage guidelines, and implementation details.

Learn more

As a reminder, the intermediate certificate updates are now available for the Apple Push Notification service (APNs) and Developer ID.

Apple Worldwide Developer Relations Intermediate Certificate (G4)

APNs SSL certificates are now issued from a new intermediate certificate (Worldwide Developer Relations G4 sub CA) exclusively focused on APNs. Use this certificate to send push notifications to apps (including VoIP), complications, websites on Safari, and Apple Wallet passes.

Apple Developer ID Intermediate Certificate (G2)

The digital certificates you use to sign your software and installer packages on macOS are now issued from a new Developer ID Intermediate Certificate that expires on September 16, 2031. Newly issued Developer ID certificates associated with the new intermediate certificate can be used to sign software on Xcode 11.4.1 and later. If you’re running Xcode 13.2 or later, the updated certificate will download automatically when you sign software after January 28, 2022. If you’re using an earlier version of Xcode, download the certificate manually or create certificates compatible with previous versions of Xcode.

Your existing certificates will continue to function until expiration or revocation, whichever comes first.

Download the updated certificates

With custom product pages, you can create up to 35 additional versions of your App Store product page to showcase different app features, content, or promotions. And now, new seamless integration with Apple Search Ads lets you easily use these pages to create tailored ad variations on the App Store.

Learn about custom product pages

Learn about Apple Search Ads

In order to provide more time for you to update your apps, we’ve changed the following requirement deadlines to June 30, 2022.

Online group event in-app purchases

In 2020, we chose to support apps and developers that needed to adapt services from in-person to digital as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, we deferred App Store Review Guideline 3.1.1, which requires apps offering paid online group services to do so via in-app purchase.

Given the recent resurgence of COVID and its continued impact on in-person services, we’ve extended the most recent deadline to June 30, 2022.

As a reminder, guideline 3.1.3(d) allows apps offering realtime person-to-person services between two individuals (for example, tutoring students, medical consultations, real estate tours, or fitness training) to use purchase methods other than in-app purchase.

Account deletion within apps

App Store Review Guideline 5.1.1 provides people with greater control over their personal data by stating that all apps that allow for account creation must also allow users to initiate deletion of their account from within the app. This requirement was set to apply to all app submissions by January 31, 2022. Due to the complexity of implementing this requirement, we’ve extended the deadline to June 30, 2022 to give you more time.

Please keep these requirements in mind when updating your app:

• The account deletion option should be easy to find in your app.
• It’s insufficient to only provide the ability to temporarily disable or deactivate an account. People should be able to delete the account along with their personal data.
• Apps in highly-regulated industries may need to provide additional support flows to confirm and facilitate the account deletion process.
• Follow applicable legal requirements for storing and retaining user account information. This includes complying with local laws in different countries or regions. As always, check with your legal counsel.

Learn more about account deletion in the Human Interface Guidelines:

iOS and iPadOS apps

macOS apps

tvOS apps

January 20, 2022

Now it’s even easier to acquire, retain, and win back subscribers. In addition to one-time-use codes, you can now create custom codes in App Store Connect — each with a unique name that you choose (such as SPRINGPROMO). Each code can be redeemed through a direct URL or within your app.

Learn how to set up custom offer codes

Learn about offer codes

Tune CPU job scheduling for Apple silicon games

Graphically-intensive games can be very demanding on hardware resources, requiring hundreds or even thousands of CPU jobs to be processed every frame. We’ll show you how you can organize those jobs to maximize CPU efficiency and performance on the M1, M1 Pro, and M1 Max chips. Learn how you can…

Apple designed the App Store to be a safe and trusted place for people to discover and download apps. Apple’s in-app purchase system, an integral part of our world-class commerce platform, offers people a private and secure user experience across apps and Apple devices, and makes it easy for them to manage their purchases and subscriptions for digital goods and services. Recent orders from the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) will allow developers of dating apps on the App Store in the Netherlands to share additional payment processing options with users. Because we do not believe these orders are in our users’ best interests, we have appealed the ACM’s decision to a higher court. We’re concerned these changes could compromise the user experience, and create new threats to user privacy and data security. In the meantime, we are obligated to make the mandated changes which we’re launching today and we will provide further information shortly.

To comply with the ACM’s order, we’re introducing two optional new entitlements exclusively applicable to dating apps on the Netherlands App Store that provide additional payment processing options for users. Dating app developers who want to continue using Apple’s in-app purchase system may do so and no further action is needed. Before considering applying for one of these entitlements, it’s important to understand that some App Store features that you may use won’t be available to your customers, in part because we cannot validate the security and safety of payments that take place outside of the App Store’s private and secure payment system. Because Apple will not be directly aware of purchases made using alternative methods, Apple will not be able to assist users with refunds, purchase history, subscription management, and other issues encountered when purchasing digital goods and services through these alternative purchasing methods. You will be responsible for addressing such issues with customers.

Learn more about these entitlements

Last year, we introduced an updated way to submit apps, in-app events, custom product pages, and product page optimization tests for review in App Store Connect. Starting January 25, 2022, the submission experience will be automatically updated for all App Store Connect accounts. You’ll be able to submit multiple items, submit without needing a new app version, view past submissions, and more.

If you’re ready to try it beforehand, Apple Developer Program Account Holders can enable the experience, which applies the update for all team members. No action is required if you’re already using the updated experience or you prefer to wait for the automatic update.

Learn more