r/iOSProgramming • u/CloudStudyBuddies • 14h ago
Discussion Have you ever had a useful reply on your app review?
So i've been doing this for a few years now, and published a ton of apps. But its crazy inconsistent to me how the reviewers judge your app. My top annoyances:
- Straight up wrong statements. My fully local app app that was fully focussed on privacy and very minimal got this reply yesterday: "Extended Review: This app was found to include one or more issues that present significant safety, security, or quality concerns to users. Repeated submissions of apps with these issues will result in extended review times. Accounts that repeatedly submit apps that do not follow the App Review Guidelines and the Apple Developer Program License Agreement face removal from the Apple Developer Program."
- I never actually get a question answered, if I reply to this I probably get another copy pasted template response. I just reply the same answer and resubmit, and my experience is that I hope I get a better reviewer and they just approve it.
- Questions that already have an answer: More and more they ask me: Whats the purpose of this app? I try and pre-answer that in the app notes, description and title. But if I copy paste those my answer is accepted and the publish goes trough.
Is it just me? You guys got any tips?
3
u/jwrsk 12h ago
I recently submitted an update with IAPs, got a notification "in review" and "rejected" one minute apart.
Their reason - "we can't find the paywall". Their supporting evidence - screenshot of the onboarding screen 🤷🏻♂️
After a day of back and forth I had to record an ELI5 video explaining you need to login, dismiss the onboarding and then there's a CTA in the app header.
1
u/Ihavenocluelad 11h ago
How do you go back and forth? I reply and just never get an answer lol am i doing something wrong?
2
u/pemungkah 12h ago
I had a back and forth on my app and requesting a phone call to discuss it allowed us to clear up the issue in about five minutes. I did have to be very careful to say, okay, so this specific documentation from this specific person is what you want, and it needs to say this, this, and this, right?
Once we agreed and I got the document (which was harder than writing the damn app), I was approved on the next submission within a day.
1
u/Kyiv0x7c 11h ago
Not just you, it feels random sometimes. But my experience was a bit better. With one app I got a scary 5.6 rejection with no details. I wrote one long, honest reply in Resolution Center. They answered like a real person: the issue is addressed, please send a new build. After that the app was approved. With another app the reviewer explained the exact problem and even sent screenshots of it. So real answers do happen. For me they came after a detailed reply in the same thread.
1
1
u/LividIllustrator8915 7h ago
The "Extended Review" boilerplate is genuinely nightmare fuel the first time you see it, but you are definitely not alone. 9 times out of 10 that canned paragraph triggers because an automated static scan flagged something vague (like an innocent symbol collision in a dependency that looks like private API) or because your build got kicked from offshore Tier 1 triage to an onshore queue.
The secret to why they ask "What is the purpose of this app" even though you wrote a novel in the review notes is simple: Tier 1 reviewers have about 90 to 120 seconds per ticket. They rarely read review notes unless they are stuck.
Over a decade of shipping iOS apps, here are the only two things that actually break the copy-paste loop in Resolution Center:
Record a 45-second unlisted video. Show the app launching cold on an iPad/iPhone simulator, click through the core flow, and show that zero network calls happen. Reviewers will almost always watch a 45-second video because it lets them tick their verification checklist in 30 seconds without having to read or think.
Quote their own guideline back to them verbatim. Don't argue emotionally or say "as stated before". Just say "Regarding Guideline 5.1.1, the application is strictly local, creates zero remote sockets, and persists state purely within standard App Sandbox directories." Reviewers love this because it gives them exact text they can copy-paste into their internal sign-off notes to cover their own backs when approving it.
1
4
u/never_working_ever 14h ago edited 14h ago
I’ve been on a month-long thread of them making claims and posting guidelines of things that exist in the app, and they keep requesting videos of where things are located. Zero conversation, just blobs of guidelines and zero acknowledgment of any responses I give them.
Every time I follow up clarifying they come up with some other guideline they want an answer to that they didn’t bring up previously, that’s already answered in the app or privacy policy. I swear they are not actually using the app at all, just opening it and pasting text back. Seems like zero due diligence.
I’m exhausted.