APNs/FCM Push Notification Strategy After Transfer

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Hi everyone,

We have an iOS app that is currently live on the App Store under Company 1's Apple Developer account, and we are planning to transfer it to Company 2's Apple Developer account using Apple's App Transfer process.

Our current push notification setup is as follows:

Push notifications are sent using Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM). Firebase is configured with an APNs Authentication Key (.p8) generated from Company 1's Apple Developer account. The app uses the same Bundle ID before and after the transfer.

We would like to understand the expected behavior after the app transfer.

Our questions are:

Will users who already have the app installed continue to receive push notifications after the app has been transferred?
Once the app is owned by Company 2, will the APNs Authentication Key from Company 1 continue to work, or must it be replaced immediately with a new key generated from Company 2's Apple Developer account?

Is there any supported way to configure APNs so that both the old and new APNs Authentication Keys can be used during the migration period, allowing push notifications to be delivered seamlessly to all users? 3)If simultaneous APNs keys are not supported, what is the recommended migration strategy to avoid any interruption in push notification delivery during the transfer?

Our goal is to ensure that existing users continue receiving push notifications without disruption while we complete the App Store transfer.

Any guidance or best practices from Apple or developers who have gone through a similar migration would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

Answer 1

Engineer OP

Apple

3h

I will explain how APNs works through app transfers, and with that understanding, you can then coordinate with FCM. I am certain they have dealt with this before.

In summary, assuming the app Bundle ID is not changing, this is just a change of ownership and who is authorized to send notifications to that app at that point in time.

Specifically answering your questions:

Yes, the users who have already installed the app from Company 1, will still receive notifications send by Company 2. There is no need to rebuild, reinstall, etc. - existing apps will continue to function the same as far as push notifications are concerned
Once the transfer is complete to Company 2, the credentials of Company 1 will cease to work. There may be a trivial but non-zero overlap or gap at the moment of transfer due to network propagation. But for practical purposes, it is one or the other. (there is also a matter of server side connection management, but with FCM you would have no control over that)
Simultaneous keys are not supported. What you would have done, were this your own servers, is you would have prepared Company 2 servers to go as soon as they received a signal, and have Company 1 servers send that signal as soon as they start receiving authentication errors. But as you are using FCM, these server level configurations is out of your control. Like I said, they have probably done this many times, and they can guide you on how to proceed with a minimum gap on their systems.