Contents

Creating an alternative app marketplace

Enable the distribution of other third-party apps from within your marketplace app.

Overview

An alternative app marketplace is an app from which someone can install other third-party apps. To create a marketplace, fill out a webform that outlines the qualifications. If approved, Apple enables a code-signing entitlement on your account to distribute your marketplace app on the web. Apple also provides you with a framework that facilitates the secure installation of apps that your marketplace distributes.

The architecture of an alternative marketplace includes an app, a webpage from which people download your app, and a web server that stores app data it regularly receives from App Store Connect. When people download an app through your alternative app marketplace, your web server communicates with the device’s operating system directly by providing authentication services, app licenses, and app data to facilitate a secure app installation experience.

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Design a marketplace app

For an alternative app marketplace:

  • Build a new app; only new bundle IDs qualify for marketplace provisioning.

  • Add a code-signing configuration that the system requires to launch your app on devices. Marketplace apps require the com.apple.developer.marketplace.app-installation entitlement, which is a managed entitlement. To provision managed entitlements, see Provisioning with managed capabilities.

  • Build with Xcode 15.3 or later, to accommodate MarketplaceKit framework availability. MarketplaceKit lets people install apps from an alternative marketplace on supported devices.

  • Help provide an age-rating appropriate browsing experience by checking the maximum allowed age rating for the device. Honor any exceptions that a parent or guardian makes for specific apps. See Providing age-rating appropriate content.

  • Use APIs that vary from App Store apps. Specifically, use AdAttributionKit for ads, and Background Assets to download large files. Use a custom e-commerce solution. API that rely on Apple’s App Store, such as In-App Purchase and On Demand Resources, don’t support alternative app marketplaces.

Add the required target property

If your app offers the purchase of digital goods or services, add the MKSellsDigitalGoods property to your app’s target configuration in Xcode with a value of YES. Also, report each offered purchase to Apple using the TransactionReporting API. For more information, see Reporting transactions for the Core Technology Commission.

If your app doesn’t sell digital goods or services, you still need to add the MKSellsDigitalGoods property to your app’s target configuration with a value of NO.

Set up your marketplace app for alternative distribution

To set up a marketplace, provide your web domain and a distribution key to App Store Connect, which facilitates the secure distribution of your app over the web.

The domain ensures that your marketplace app installs only from your website, and the distribution key:

  • Regularly verifies the agreement, or relationship, you make with other developers that distribute their app on your marketplace.

  • Signs a token that the system uses to verify each installation request of your app, or the apps that your marketplace distributes.

For more information, see Distributing your app from your website.

Facilitate the life cycle of your apps

When a developer prepares to distribute their app on your marketplace, provide them a marketplace token. They upload the token in App Store Connect, which enables them to choose your marketplace as a distributor. The process of generating and exchanging the token occurs between just your app marketplace and the inquring app developer. For more information, see Creating keys and establishing alternative marketplace connections.

To handle other regular requests, implement a web server that:

  • Manages available apps by communicating with App Store Connect. When an app that your maketplace distributes completes Notarization, App Store Connect sends the app to your server. App Store Connect also notifies your server when a developer removes an app from sale or when Apple issues an app take-down request. To receive notifications and perform the actions they require, see Processing alternative app marketplace notifications.

  • Provides apps and app licenses to a person’s device. When a person attempts to download an app from your marketplace, the system requests a license from your server, followed by the app itself. The system calls various endpoints that you publish on your server to process license requests and app requests. For more information, see Installing apps from an alternative marketplace.

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Although you store apps on — and serve apps from — your web server, people install the apps only from within your alternative app marketplace app, not your website.

Test the app during development

App marketplace development can occur anywhere in the world, as Xcode allows running a development-signed or Ad-Hoc signed app marketplace on Simulator and all supported physical devices. Through the development build, apps that the marketplace distributes can also install and run.

However, workflows that involve submission to App Store Connect, such as beta testing your app through internal TestFlight and web distribution of your marketplace app, need to occur on a device in the supported region, signed in with an Apple Account configured with a matching supported country or region.

You can test the installation of the apps that your marketplace distributes on a physical device when:

To test distribution over the web, ensure:

See Also

Essentials