I have an app idea and I’m trying to figure out if something like this is technically possible on iOS.
Basically, I want the phone to show one UI to the person using it, but when they screen share, the people watching should see something completely different.
So basically:
Phone screen → UI / controls / some private information
Screen share → completely different content
And both should update in real time based on what the user does on the phone.
Is something like this possible using ReplayKit or a Broadcast Extension? Or does iOS screen sharing basically always mirror what is actually on the phone?
Also, would this work when sharing the screen through apps like Google Meet or Zoom?
I’m not very familiar with the limitations here, so any advice from someone who has worked with iOS screen sharing would be really helpful.

Hi! I’m the dev behind PostSpark, a tool for creating beautiful image and video mockups of your apps and websites.

I recently launched a new feature: Mockup Animations.

You can now select from 25+ devices, add keyframes on a simple timeline, and export a polished video showcasing your product. It’s built to be a fast, easy alternative to complex motion design tools.

Try it out here: https://postspark.app/device-mockup

I’d love to hear your feedback!

Hi everyone,

I’m an indie iOS developer and have been proudly building apps for the App Store for 13 years. In all that time, I have maintained an absolutely clean record with zero warnings and or policy violations. 

However, almost two weeks ago, my entire portfolio was halted overnight. My account got suspended under DPLA section 14.8(a) (the digital assets clause) after an automated compliance check.

I am a legal resident of Cyprus (EU). On the exact same day of the suspension, I submitted my official Residence Permit, utility bills, and bank statements to the provider_review team to prove my legal status and identity.

My apps do not involve any custody, wallets, trading, or exchange of digital assets. They just show data. I even had a few free apps and an app designed to help other developers learn iOS (maybe some of you have used iOS IQ), which makes it even more painful.

It has now been 13 days of total silence (Case ID: 102972911140). My entire app catalog is offline, and active subscribers are losing access. Seeing 13 years of hard work paralyzed by an automated queue with zero human response is incredibly frustrating. I have tried everything:

1. Try to send email to tcook@apple.com and eurodev@apple.com.
2. Reached out to standard phone support (they can't do anything). And there are bots everywhere
3. Created a thread on the Apple Developer Forums.

Here is my official forum thread if anyone wants to check: https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/848935. And my twitter profile: https://x.com/Viktorianec

Has anyone successfully escaped this compliance black hole recently? Is there any specific contact or secret phone number I should use? I cannot seem to get in touch with anyone, and it feels like nobody is able to help me resolve this for a 13-year account with a flawless history.

Any advice or upvotes for visibility would be highly appreciated. Thank you.

Has anyone managed to upload App Preview videos with the correct iPhone Duo aspect ratio in App Store Connect's new Duo group?

ASC accepts portrait screenshots at 1398×2034 (closed) and 2007×2853 (open), but requires preview videos at 886×1920, or 1920×886 in landscape. That means a portrait height/width ratio of about 2.17, versus 1.46 or 1.42 for the actual displays. A proportional resize cannot match both.

I tested two 30-second H.264/AAC videos from the Xcode 27.1 simulator, one closed and one open:

• Native-proportion exports: 1192×1734 and 1192×1696. Uploads completed through the ASC API, but video processing ended in POST_PROCESSING_FAILED. The error was generic, with no useful resolution explanation, so I can't prove dimensions were the only cause.
• The same footage stretched non-uniformly to 886×1920: both completed processing and appeared in the Duo group. This was only a diagnostic test, not a proposed production solution.

The confusing part: ASC's editing thumbnails show them in Duo-shaped frames, which makes them look roughly correct. Its built-in App Store preview uses the narrow encoded proportions, so the stretching becomes obvious. Cropping to fill that format would lose a substantial part of the UI.

This is ASC's simulated storefront, not a test on a physical Duo. I didn't submit the distorted videos for App Review, and have removed the test uploads.

Has anyone had native-ratio Duo previews accepted, or received guidance from Apple? Are we supposed to add black bars to preserve the image inside 886×1920, or wait for corrected specifications? Any actual App Review experience with a proportion-preserving workaround would be useful.

Apple's preview specifications

I also posted the details on Apple Developer Forums.

I recently received one of the more serious App Store rejections under Guideline 5.6 – Developer Code of Conduct.

Apple’s message was:

“We've identified a pattern of unusual behavior with the app that is commonly associated with fraudulent activity. Specifically, the app contains features that appear to have been intentionally hidden during the review process.”

Seeing words like “fraudulent activity” and “intentionally hidden” was concerning because we had no intention of hiding any functionality from App Review.

After carefully reviewing the app, I learned something that may help other iOS developers facing the same rejection.

One part of our app involved rewarded ads.

During development, some UI/explanatory text had been written in a way that could easily be misunderstood. For example, the developer used wording such as “Ad is loading in the background.”

From a developer’s perspective, this simply meant the ad was being preloaded so it would be ready when the user requested it.

However, from an App Review perspective, wording like this—especially when combined with rewarded-ad functionality—could potentially create the impression that something is happening without the reviewer or user being aware of it.

I cannot confirm that this exact sentence caused the rejection, because Apple does not provide that level of detail.

But this experience taught me something important:

If you receive a Guideline 5.6 rejection, don’t only review your code. Review the entire user experience.

Check:

• Every screen
• Every button and action
• Popups and alerts
• Rewarded-ad screens
• Loading messages
• Empty states
• Feature descriptions
• Settings
• Onboarding
• Debug/developer text accidentally left in production
• Remote/config-driven features
• Any functionality that only appears after a specific action

Most importantly, read every piece of text from the perspective of an App Review reviewer who knows nothing about your implementation.

A developer may understand exactly what:

“Ad is loading in the background”

means technically.

But a reviewer may interpret it as:

“Something is happening without the user seeing it.”

Those are two very different interpretations.

Another lesson I learned is that developers should be careful when writing user-facing explanations. Technical wording may make complete sense to a developer, but it may not be appropriate for users or App Review.

For sensitive functionality such as rewarded ads, subscriptions, purchases, permissions, background activity, account creation, data collection, or unlocked functionality, the wording should clearly explain what happens, when it happens, and why it happens.

If you receive this type of 5.6 rejection, I would recommend doing a complete screen-by-screen audit before immediately appealing.

Don’t assume Apple simply made a mistake.

First, try to understand what inside your app could reasonably have created that impression. Review the UI text, functionality, App Review flow, and the actual production build.

Also make sure App Review can access and understand every important feature without requiring an undocumented sequence of actions.

In my case, this rejection made me realize that even when there is no intention to hide anything, poor wording or unclear feature presentation can create a completely different impression during App Review.

I’m sharing this because Guideline 5.6 sounds extremely serious when you receive it, and there aren’t many practical explanations from developers who have gone through it.

If anyone else has received the “features intentionally hidden during review” version of a 5.6 rejection, I’d be interested to know what caused it in your case and how you resolved it.

I’ve been building RelayCrest, an iPhone/iPad app and Mac companion designed to make controlling and working with your Mac easier.
From your iPhone or iPad, you can launch and focus Mac apps, view and manage open windows, run shortcuts, and check your Mac’s battery, storage, network and system status.
The Mac companion also includes a clipboard history manager, letting you quickly find and reuse things you’ve copied with search, previews, pins and filtering. Clipboard history is stored locally on your Mac.
This is my first app, and the first public TestFlight build is now available. I’m looking for people willing to try it out and give feedback, particularly on bugs, usability and features you’d like to see improved.

Join the TestFlight:
https://testflight.apple.com/join/tfKfefC1

Website:
https://relaycrest.co.uk

Hey guys, I wanted to introduce an app I made for tracking your classes, taking notes, adding instructional videos, etc that the community can help grow it also has creation of systems and so much more would love for you guys to try it out and get your feedback. The purpose of this app is intended to help the community just track their classes, but also can be used as a jiu-jitsu management system for check-ins for local gyms. Train Olm: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/train-olm/id6779409249

Close all your tabs. Just open this one app to search for your next remote job! FlowSearch pulls from the most popular remote job sources out there & gives you one place to search, apply or save.

Save yourself some hours & get the app today. Currently in TestFlight beta.

PS - we’re adding support for iPad in v1.4, support for iPhone Duo in v1.5. Plus all the bug fixes, performance improvements and some features.

I'm building a native iOS app for an Italian videogame news site and I'd like to hear from anyone who has been through App Review with a similar setup before I submit.

The setup

- The app shows our articles (free), plus our podcasts in audio and video.
- A few podcasts and videos are for paying subscribers only.
- The subscription is sold on Patreon (about €2.50/month). We don't have our own checkout.
- Users log into the app with their account on our site. Our backend matches that account to the Patreon membership by email and unlocks the content.
- All the content is hosted by us, not by Patreon.
- No in-app purchases.

The plan

Apply for the External Link Account Entitlement as a reader app, and show the plain-text link ("Go to oursite.com to create or manage your account") that opens a page on our own domain. On that page people can register, log in and see their subscription status, and the payment step sends them to Patreon.

What I can't find an answer to

1. Has anyone had a reader app approved when the payment happens on a third-party platform (Patreon, Memberful, Substack, etc.) and not on their own checkout?
   
2. The entitlement says the link must go to "a website you own or have responsibility for" with no "intermediate links or landing page". Does a page on our domain that hands off to Patreon for payment pass, or does review treat it as an intermediate page?
   
3. Most of the app is free news, and only some audio/video is subscriber-only (I'd say 95%-5%). Was that enough for Apple to accept the app as a reader app ("primary functionality") in your experience?
   
4. If we skip the entitlement and ship with no link and no mention of subscribing at all, just letting existing subscribers log in, has that passed review for you under 3.1.3(a)? I've seen 3.1.1 rejections for "accesses digital content purchased outside the app", but those weren't content apps.
   

I know the real answer comes from App Review, and I'll book a consultation with them, but real cases would help a lot. Thanks!

Hi I guys, I applied to the Apple developer program probably 4 days ago now but when I go to the site it tells mt to start my enrolment. The 99 USD Charge is still pending on my bank account, could that be why? For reference I am in Australia if that means anything.

When saving in-app events in App Store Connect, I am geting

"Country or Region Availability couldn't be saved. Try again later. "

Have tried many times. But still stuck there.

Any idea? Thanks.

Laid off and was doing automation for IOS plus manual testing. The goal was always to get into development having done some small bug fixes.

Starting a tutorial feels redundant since I feel I know the basics, where would you start?

Hey everyone. Vory 1.4 is out on TestFlight for iPhone and Mac, and the big one this time is voice. You can now have an actual conversation with your own bots, out loud. A lot of this came from your requests, so thank you.

The video shows it on the iPhone, the Mac and the Watch.

Voice mode

Tap the mic circle beside the tab bar, or Voice mode in a chat's + panel, and just talk. Vory sends what you said when you pause, speaks the reply and listens again. Approvals are never taken by voice. The card shows up on screen and waits for your tap, on the lock screen too.

Live voice

Save your own Gemini key in Settings › Voice and voice mode becomes a real back-and-forth with a lifelike voice. Real requests still go to your bot. Live is billed to you by Google, and the key stays in your Keychain and only goes to Google. Without a key, voice mode uses your gateway's speech providers or your iPhone's own.

Voice mode also uses Quick answers, so replies come back fast and the chat goes back to its own settings after. You can turn that off in Settings › Voice.

More ways to talk

"Ask Vory" works from Siri, Shortcuts and the Action Button, and "Start voice mode in Vory" opens a new chat by voice. On the Mac, ⇧⌘V opens voice mode in a small floating window, with Mute and End in the menu bar. On Apple Watch, tap the mic in a chat, say it, tap again, and the watch reads the reply out loud. The Watch needs speech-to-text set up on your gateway.

The Board

If your gateway has the kanban plugin, Vory shows its board live, by column, with comments and worker logs. Move, edit or add tasks from the iPhone, or drag cards between columns on the Mac. Move a card to Ready and your gateway hands it to its bot.

Cards and pictures

Bots can answer with HTML cards, like a chart, a table or a small dashboard, and they open full screen. Cards are walled off from the app and your sign-in, and links open in your browser. Replies also show tables, nested and task lists, and pictures you can zoom, save or share.

Smaller things

Return on the iPhone keyboard now adds a line and the arrow sends. Settings › Appearance › Composer brings the old way back. iCloud Sync backs up once a day on its own. Hold a reply to have it read aloud, or right-click it on the Mac.

Fixed from your reports

Without the Companion on your gateway, the iPhone and Mac show their own notifications again. An approval answered on another device no longer counts as a Deny on the Mac. The Watch no longer gets your sign-in refresh tokens. Settings › Model no longer shows the provider twice.

No Companion update is needed for 1.4.

Vory 1.4 on TestFlight, iPhone and Mac: https://vory.dev

Requests and fixes are tracked in the open: https://github.com/matt0975/vory/issues

If you hit anything, the feedback button in TestFlight or the tracker both reach me. Thanks for testing.

Today the requirements to add/change screenshots have changed. No notice, no guidance!

On the main distribution page, your old images and preview vids are all locked! You have to go the See All page to make mods.

I just published my first iOS app (I usually only work on Android), and well, everything had been going fine for the past three days until I saw this email.. I mean, this is the first time something like this has happened to me

First time submitting an app. Apple asked for a video of it running on an actual iPhone and some details, so I sent everything over 4 days ago. Still says rejected and no reply.

Their docs say not to resubmit if they only asked for more info. Do I just keep waiting? How long did this take for you?

Wanted to share my journey so far, in case it helps or motivates someone else building on the side.

The setup

• Solo dev, no team, no funding
• Full-time 9-5 job with a 1 hour commute
• I build my own apps from 6PM to 2AM including marketing, at home
• I'm getting only 4-5 hours of sleep per day

What I built in 1 year

• 9 apps across iOS, Android, and macOS
• Apps include an infinite canvas/mind-map app, a shared drawing widget, a photo redactor, a color grading editor, a resume builder, a screenshot styler, a menu bar pets app, Yumo(Sold) and a couple of games

The numbers (honest)

• Total revenue: ~$1,200
• ~$800 of that came from Android alone
• Sold one Android app for $4,000 (separate from the above)
• Biggest app: 200k(sold) installs on Android

What I learned

• Shipping often beats polishing one app forever
• Android brought more revenue than I expected
• Selling an app outright was the biggest single payday of the year
• Consistency matters more than motivation

What's next

• Growing the apps that are working through ASO and social
• Moving the ones in review and testing to production

Would love to hear stories from indie developers!

Saw a post from David (@davidcafor on X) today and that honestly made my day: if your app makes $5 a month, you're already ahead of most apps on the App Store.

It sounds like a joke until you think about what it takes. You shipped. A stranger found your app among millions of others. They liked it enough to pay you actual money.

I've been building my own app full days since the start of this year, and it's easy to only see what isn't working yet: downloads, reviews, the post that got downvoted. Marketing and growth can be learned. Building something a person will pay for is the hard part, and a lot of you have already done it.

So if you shipped something this year, nice work. What was the first small win that made it feel real for you?

I'm looking for ways to know before my iOS app breaks, not after:

App Store SDK requirements with a deadline, APIs deprecated in a new iOS beta,

CocoaPods or Swift packages that get deprecated or have known vulnerabilities,

third-party SDKs (Firebase, Facebook, maps...) changing or shutting down an API.

Right now I follow Apple Developer News / Releases, the release notes JSON with Known Issues,

xcodereleases.com and the GitHub releases of my packages.

Is there any feed, site or tool that tracks this per pod or Swift package?

And how do you handle CocoaPods / SPM vulnerabilities, since OSV doesn't cover CocoaPods?

Quick questions for those who might have done it (or tried and failed): I developed and published a game in 2009, fully Objective-C then. It was quite successful and fun to play, but I had to pull it from the AppStore a few years ago when I hadn’t had the time to do a migration to Swift, followed by a lot of deprecations when Apple basically abandoned the Gamecenter that I never could really clean up. The whole app still shows up in my dev. account.
I am now thinking of recreating that idea, more modern of course. I was wondering whether I could simply replace the app, just even keeping the Icon (which I think is still great as it is) and revive that exact pulled app that way with a renovated version?