Developers

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Reasons Why Developers Prefer Testing on iOS

Charlotte Henry ·

There are a variety of reasons why many developers prefer to launch and test their apps on iOS instead of Android. Screenrant broke down some of them, including the benefits of the greater control and uniformity found in Apple’s system.

There are many reasons why developers tend to prefer iOS over Android with a commonly suggested one being that iOS users are more likely to spend on apps than Android users. However, the locked down user base is a far more basic and important reason from the developer perspective. With iOS, developers gain access to a significant number of users and on a limited number of devices. This combination lends itself very well to apps that are still in an early and beta testing state. Essentially, the level of control developers have over the iOS experience is far greater than with Android, and that’s likely to make a significant difference when deciding which operating system to launch on first.

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Apple Shares ‘MySwimPro’ in Developer Spotlight

Andrew Orr ·

Apple has highlighted Fares Ksebati and his app MySwimPro in its Developer Spotlight. It provides aquatic workout videos for athletes.

What do you know now that you wish you’d known when you started? That it’s really important to be consistent, that it takes time to develop, and that if you can just be a little bit better every single day, the compounding impact is absolutely insane. We’ve been at this for five years, which is more than 1,800 days, and we’re trying to be at least 1 percent better each day.

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Where are the Safari 14 WebExtensions?

Andrew Orr ·

In 2020 Apple announced it would support browser extensions that used the WebExtensions API. But as Jason Snell points out, we haven’t seen many yet. One developer listed possible barriers for entry:

Limited time, lack of access to Apple hardware, unfamiliarity with Apple’s developer tools, Safari’s incompatibility with some existing extension-development tools, and the requirement to make some code changes in order to fit inside Apple’s security model.

I think another barrier is probably the US$99/year developer program fee. It makes sense if you’re already in the program to build an extension if it makes sense for you, but I don’t think many outside of the program will pay that just to release a new extension. Then again, it’s still in the early days of this new support.

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Apple’s 85/15 Subscription Split Doesn’t Help Developers Much

Andrew Orr ·

Unlike Apple’s 70/30 split for in-app purchases, it offers an 85/15 split for subscriptions from customers that stay subscribed for at least a year. But Jacob Eiting writes how that doesn’t really help developers because of subscriber churn.

No matter how great an app is, subscribers are going to churn. Sometimes it’s because of a credit card expiring or some other billing issue. And sometimes it’s more of a pause, and the user comes back after a few months. But the majority of churn comes from subscribers who, for whatever reason, decide that the app just isn’t worth paying for anymore. If a subscriber churns before the 1-year mark, the developer never sees that 85% split. And even if the user resubscribes, Apple and Google reset the clock if a subscription has lapsed for more than 60 days.