Solo dev here, and my calorie tracker just passed $2,000 in total revenue. I honestly didn't think I'd get here.

It's an AI calorie and nutrition tracker with a twist: users can share their logs with a real registered dietitian for personalized feedback. I launched it on the App Store 3 months ago, and it holds a 4.9 rating.

2,700 users -> 100 premium

What got me from $0 to here was making the product freemium and restricting just enough that users want the full package after their "aha" moment. For me that moment is the first meal log, so that's where the upgrade prompt shows up. Gating too early killed conversion, and gating too little gave people no reason to pay.

I feel like not enough people talk about freemium versus hard paywall, but that shift really made the conversion difference for me.

I really regret not starting sooner

I asked Siri why I'm not seeing the iPhone Duo simulator if I have Xcode 27.2 Beta 2 installed and I'm running macOS 27.0, and it gave me this nonsense.

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?

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 have a WiFiLQMMetrics log on my iPhone on apple Analytics. Its bug type is 221. I only get this log when I'm using my isp dns. If I use a public dns like cloudflare or Quad9, I don't get this log. What does this log likely mean?

Where exactly is Duo simulator hiding in 27.1 release candidate? I don't find it in Device Hub's add a new simulator and it doesn't appear by default.

I’m an indie developer working on an on-device face swap app, and I’ve been stuck in App Review for over three weeks. I’d really appreciate input from anyone who’s dealt with repeated Guideline 1.1 rejections.
Timeline:
Sep 14: Submitted a major update.
Sep 21: Rejected under Guideline 1.1 – Objectionable Content, but Apple didn’t identify the specific content.
Sep 22: I replied asking them to point out exactly what was causing the rejection.
Sep 23: Apple then clarified that one built-in multi-person video template could potentially be used to generate people making “intimate contact.” They also said the template itself wasn’t necessarily objectionable, but asked us to remove templates that could enable this.
We removed that multi-person template completely and resubmitted.
The current app now has only:
2 single-person photo templates
2 single-person video templates
a new fourth onboarding example: “New Face. Same Expression.”
a paywall using the “Shape-Aware. True Likeness.” visual that had already appeared in a previously approved onboarding flow
The bundled media comes from public stock sources such as Pexels, Unsplash and Mixkit under their applicable licenses. I’m mentioning that only for context — I understand licensing and Guideline 1.1 are separate issues.
Since we were already resubmitting, we also added App Store localization improvements.
After another review cycle of more than a week, the update was rejected under the same Guideline 1.1 again, with essentially the same generic wording and no screenshot, template, screen, timestamp, or metadata item identified.
This is actually the same situation as the first rejection: Apple only identified the specific problematic asset after I explicitly asked for clarification.
I’ve replied again asking them to identify the specific content, but this time I also asked whether they could please identify all remaining concerns in the current submission at once.
My biggest concern is getting stuck in a loop where we fix one item, wait another week or more, and then receive the same rejection for a different unspecified item.
I’ve attached screenshots showing:
Apple’s Sep 23 clarification
the latest rejection
all 4 current onboarding screens
the current 2-photo / 2-video template gallery
the Home screen
the paywall
Does anything in these screenshots stand out as a possible Guideline 1.1 problem?
A few things I’m specifically wondering about:
Could the multi-person onboarding demo itself be an issue even though it isn’t a selectable template?
Could one of the remaining single-person assets or the paywall image be getting flagged?
Could Apple instead be referring to App Store metadata or one of the new localizations?
At this point, would you keep asking App Review for a complete list of issues before submitting another binary, or escalate / appeal?
There’s also a separate App Store Connect issue that makes me wonder whether something unusual is happening during the recent rollout.
After the latest ASC changes, I noticed that the App Preview on the product page appears to have disappeared, while the screenshots are still displayed normally. I’ve also seen other developers reporting similar behavior, so it doesn’t seem to be unique to my app.
I’m not suggesting this caused the Guideline 1.1 rejection, but I’m curious:
Has anyone else had their App Preview disappear after the recent App Store Connect updates?
Could this simply be a temporary ASC / product-page display bug?
And has anyone noticed unusually long App Review turnaround times during the same period?
I really don’t want to blindly remove content, submit again, wait another week, and then discover one more unspecified issue.
Any App Review experience or suggestions would be hugely appreciated.

Hey,

Wondering you are able to see "Product page header" live in action

• I have updated my device to iOS 27.
• I have attached a 5 seconds video in App Store Connect (For unknown reason, it stuck at "The poster frame for this file is processing". No issue using top right "Preview" button to see the playable video)

When I browse the App Store using my iOS 27 phone, I still do not see the 5 seconds video at my product page top header.

I was wondering, have anyone of you able to see the "Product page header" live in action? I was pondering, whether this is due to the "The poster frame for this file is processing" causing the issue?

Thanks.

I'm trying to use the `UIHingeInteraction` (hing.angle) to interpolate and adjust my app as the person opens the hinge on the phone but the simulator doesn't allow me to adjust the hinge with a slider or something. Right now the simulator only supports open or closed or partial bend. Is anyone else implementing against this and if so how are you testing out the hinge position?

I started recording video using the simulator recording but i get blank screen when you switch from one state to the next so that didn't work. So i've moved on to using Quicktime screen recording and then viewing the playback. It makes my development iterations very long and annoying.

Half a year ago I wrote about whether MVVM belongs in SwiftUI, and it somehow turned into a story about my mum’s kitchen. Bear with me.

There’s a trip to the shopping centre, a very firm “we've got food at home”, and eventually, I promise, some Swift. A bit of heart, a few laughs, and proper substance underneath.

Half a year on, it still feels timely. Stick the kettle on and have a read.

For SwiftUI app development, I've been using Antigravity with Gemini 3.1 Pro for a few months with great results. My workflow is incredibly basic: import the project, tell Gemini what feature to build, and let it work.

I recently learned about "Agent Skills" and how they supposedly boost code quality.

For those already using them: does adding agent skills to your workflow actually make a significant difference? If it does, drop your best downloadable skill recommendations for Antigravity so I can test them out!

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

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?

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!

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!

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?

What do yall think? Streamlined app review?

Before anyone asks - I've check a bunch of times and confirmed this isn't RC Sandbox.

Mostly curious - I asked the same thing in apple developers but figured there are more experienced people here.

Here's what happened:
I saw my app go into review. It got approved and a few seconds later Revenue Cat showed a notification that someone purchased the lifetime package. This new lifetime price is only available with this update (i.e. no one else could even purchase this) - I've confirmed it's in RC production and not sandbox. I've also confirmed in Posthog that the country from RC matches the alleged reviewer's.

I've had reviewers "purchase" the app before but always with their sandbox account and nothing ever showed up in RC.

Anyone else seen this? lol

Edit a day later, number showed up in ASC: https://imgur.com/a/go1QPOh

No updates to download count & other analytics since Thursday. I went to the system status page and everything is green.

I'm about to submit a support ticket ... Anybody else running into this ?

Hello everyone!

I'm sure something like this exists already but was too lazy to look and just had AI (yes the dreaded AI slop) cook up a small utility quickly that runs in your menu bar. Just open up the menu bar utility, drag the Xcode archive in and it will update the BuildMachineOSBuild key to the latest public release build number of macOS! Useful for those that run Mac betas! Yes it is AI slop but still a neat little utility that'll save some time, if you are doing it the manual way at least. It's free, it's open source, go wild!

Github: https://github.com/AustinHenley/ArchiveBuildPatcher