--- title: App Groups Entitlement framework: bundleresources role: symbol role_heading: Property List Key path: bundleresources/entitlements/com.apple.security.application-groups --- # App Groups Entitlement A list of identifiers specifying the groups your app belongs to. ## Discussion Discussion App groups allow multiple apps produced by a single development team to access shared containers and keychain access groups, and communicate using interprocess communication (IPC). Apps may belong to one or more app groups. Format the identifier as follows: group. Apple ensures that the group name you choose is unique when you register the app group on the Apple Developer website. For more information, see Register an app group. In macOS, you can also create app groups or add apps to existing app groups using this identifier format: . You don’t need to register app groups that use this format on the Apple Developer website. Apps within an app group share access to a group container. For more information about container creation, location, and deletion, see containerURL(forSecurityApplicationGroupIdentifier:). Apps within a group can communicate with other members in the group using IPC mechanisms including Mach IPC, XPC, POSIX semaphores and shared memory, and UNIX domain sockets. In macOS, use app groups to enable IPC communication between two sandboxed apps, or between a sandboxed app and a nonsandboxed app. You use the app group identifier in the service identifier for your IPC mechanism, so keep these restrictions in mind when creating your app group identifier: | | | | | App groups that you register in your Apple Developer profile also act as keychain access groups. For more information about the relationship between app groups and keychain access groups, see Sharing access to keychain items among a collection of apps. To add this entitlement to your app, enable the App Groups capability in Xcode, and add the groups your app belongs to. ## See Also ### Application groups - [Keychain Access Groups Entitlement](bundleresources/entitlements/keychain-access-groups.md)