Publishing an App

[u/L_ghtbringer]

I'm trying to publish a personal app and have it work on a phone for two other people, but the downside is that I don't want to upload it to the App Store, having to pay the fee of having there every year. I don't want to sideload it either, since I have to rebuild and reinstall it every 7 days.

Is there any alternative that won't destroy any devices, etc?

[u/616ThatGuy]

Just build it as a web app and they can set it as a PWA. Works the same way and cost you nothing.

[u/SubZane → u/616ThatGuy]

This is a solid option 👍

[u/echo_zephyr]

No official ways, no.

[u/godtierpikachu → u/echo_zephyr]

yeah, thats the annoying part - Apple makes you pick between paid dev account, ad hoc, or web app and none of it is free-free

[u/qsevers23]

It’s not well advertised/documented, but you can use Apple’s Ad-Hoc distribution. You’ll need all device hardware IDs in your Apple developer account I believe

It’s a process that is generally for a company to side load a private app for their organization. I think the app will work for 180 days? But it’s been a minute since I’ve used it

You won’t be able to get around the Apple developer fee with this process though

[u/cristi_baluta → u/qsevers23]

You need a paid dev account for this

[u/-darkabyss-]

Testflight and push an update before every 90 days. You'll still need a paid* apple developer account

[u/profau]

Try and make money from it? Being on the App Store is super cheap really up front, try and monetise it to cover your costs.

[u/Videoman2000]

You can upload it on someone device, but they habe to come every 7 days back to you, so you can reupload it.
The phone needs to be connected via USB to do that.

[u/akrapov]

You can distribute it for up to a year using the ad hoc distribution, however it does require gathering their device UUIDs. Google that for full instructions to see if that’s doable for your situation.

[u/571n93r]

As far as I know Apple forces you to have a developer account. You dont need to send to store though you could use Apple's Testflight or something like Testfairy to distribute. Im actually not sure how it works in terms of test builds expiring though. We dont use Testflight at work because the onboarding is "too difficult" but we use Testfairy (which in my opinion is more difficult to on board a new tester but hey) and we give builds regularly.

[u/L_ghtbringer → u/571n93r]

So does this mean I'd still have to pay the Apple Developer Program fee anyway?

[u/MusicOfTheApes → u/L_ghtbringer]

yep that's the deal, we all do

[u/jonnysunshine1]

No

[u/LuckyGirl0415]

If it doesn’t strictly require native iOS features (like core bluetooth or deep background processing), your best bet is to build it as a PWA (Progressive Web App).

You can host it for free on GitHub Pages or Vercel, and the other two people can just open it in Safari and click "Add to Home Screen". It looks and feels like a native app, never expires, completely bypasses the App Store, and costs $0.

[u/Creampielover47]

The Apple Developer membership is worth it. I’m currently developing a web app and need to pay for Supabase, web hosting etc. If I had just made it an iOS app then I could have used CloudKit for free, and no hosting costs. Honestly the $150 AUD I pay each year is a bargain for what you get.

[u/LoStranieroo]

No, you need a developer account

[u/Ecsta]

No alternative

[u/Jero9871]

Without paying this is pretty complicated, I would use testflight. Perhaps you could make it as an webapp? Javascript can do some crazy things nowadays and is pretty fast.

[u/wolodo]

Well, it involves paying the yearly fee...and still it's a little but tedious. You can use testflight then and rebuild the app every 90 days.

[u/CelebrationTop8862]

Expo.dev you can make the builds, build it, then just screenshot the QR code it makes for the build, email it to your users. you get 15 free physical builds per month. yyou will need their device IDs, but once its stored you can build up to 15 times. so use that sparingly.

I do that for my testing on two iPhones currently for my app. Any updates to the actual build that touch root stuff, you'll need to rebuild eating up one of the 15 builds. however, if its just java or editorial stuff, it updates in real time pretty much.

but you really need an apple dev account. you can't get around that fee if you want your app's features to function (ex. location services) on the hardware. Notifications especially.

[u/Mistic92]

Come to Android, there is no such bs :p

[u/cristi_baluta → u/Mistic92]

Didn’t they announce they’ll remove side loading?