Notifications

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Learn about the technical aspects of notification delivery on device, including notification types, priorities, and notification center management.

Notifications Documentation

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How do I manually associate an iOS app counterpart to my macOS app to deduplicate Notifications from iPhone?
Howdy, I'm trying to figure out how to replicate the following behavior for our app: The system is able to ascertain that the Mac equivalent of some iOS app is installed locally, and it prevents notifications from being mirrored. However, I am unable to determine how this association is inferred. When I check our iOS app under this prefpane, the switch remains enabled and toggleable—we'd like to act like Slack here. My initial assumption is that an app group containing both the Mac and iOS apps can be used to create the association; however, I would like to confirm that this is indeed the case before doing so. I'm not terribly confident about this. Details: The bundle identifiers of both apps do not match. This also applies to Slack; its iOS app is com.tinyspeck.chatlyio while its Mac app is com.tinyspeck.slackmacgap. In our case, the iOS app's identifier is like com.company.app while the Mac app's identifier is com.company.app.desktop. Both apps are signed with certificates that have matching team identifiers. The com.apple.developer.team-identifier entitlement is present on the Mac app. The Mac app shares a keychain access group with the iOS app. The Mac app is not sandboxed. The Mac app is an Electron app. The Mac app does not use APNs. It sends notifications "locally". I currently only have the iOS app installed on my iPhone via TestFlight, if that matters. Notification mirroring does work, but we'd like to forcibly disable this by associating the apps together. To my knowledge, the iOS app makes use of both a UNNotificationServiceExtension and a UNNotificationContentExtension. The iOS app currently doesn't have an assigned category (at least in Xcode). The Mac app is currently miscategorized as a developer tool (LSApplicationCategoryType = "public.app-category.developer-tools";), but that should be fixed. (Redacted) bundle information for the Mac app: CFBundleDisplayName = App; CFBundleExecutable = "App Desktop"; CFBundleName = App; Note that our CFBundleExecutable differs from the bundle's display name/name because we're currently migrating our users to a new version of the app that they'd likely want to live alongside the new one. The filename of the bundle itself is, similarly, App Desktop.app. For the iOS app, to my knowledge, the CFBundleName and CFBundleDisplayName are App.
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125
Mar ’25
Unable to download APNS new Key configuration
I created new APNS key, when i clicked on download, this is the error am getting: Download Failed Auth Key can only be downloaded once. This auth key has already been downloaded. I dont have any key before and i have not downloaded the key before, it just a new key, i just created. Please this is affecting the release of our client app, and the client is having negative thought concern our service not knowing it from you guys.
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271
Sep ’25
Live Activities - Missing Entitlement
I've built an app that supports live activities, but when trying to build and deploy I'm getting the error: Provisioning profile "iOS Team Provisioning Profile doesn't include the com.apple.developer.live-activity entitlement." Looking in Xcode - under signing and provisions, there is no "Live Activity" option to select. Looking in the developer portal, similarly under Certificates, Identifiers & Profiles, there is no "Live Activity" option. I've added com.apple.developer.live-activity to my entitlements file for both my widget and my main app target, and added NSSupportsLiveActivities to my info.plist files. I'm building on Xcode Version 16.0 Any ideas on how to fix this? Super confused! Thanks in advance!
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778
Dec ’24
didReceive isn't called in CarPlay scene
I have set up an iOS application with CarPlay scene using carplay-driving-tasks entitlement. And as per latest policy changes I'm able to get push notifications in the CarPlay screen. But unlike from phone scene, when I tap on a notification from CarPlay I don't get a trigger on didReceive method to intercept the payload of the notification that user tapped on. Is there any other ways or configuration needed to get this working? I just need to get the payload and present an Alert template within the CarPlay when user taps on a CarPlay notification and the app opens.
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77
Jul ’25
Notification coordination between iOS and watchOS is not working properly
Notification coordination between iOS and watchOS is not working properly watchOS and iOS try to coordinate between phone and watch notifications. The concept here is that if there is a main app and a companion app, they could both be sending a notification, then the notification would alert on both, which is a deviation from how notification mirroring is handled if there is an iOS app but no watch app. The watch waits for the iOS notification to fire so they can determine if this is the same notification that needs to be deduped, displayed on one device but not the other, or separate notifications to be displayed both. If there is no notification on the phone, the watch will timeout after 13 seconds and alert anyway. If you have an iOS companion app, the best solution to this is to send the same notification on both devices simultaneously, and ensuring the UNNotificationRequest.identifier matches on both notifications. This will let the systems determine how to handle the notification correctly and quickly, and the notification will alert right away. https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/765669 According to the above article, "when a notification arrives on watchOS alone first, it coordinates with iOS," but in reality, it doesn't work properly. Detailed process of this phenomenon watchOS receives a notification. On watchOS, the notification is not immediately shown to the user. iOS receives a notification with the same UNNotificationRequest.identifier as in (1). The notification in (3) does not appear on either iOS or watchOS. However, the notification from (3) does appear in iOS Notification Center. Thirteen seconds after watchOS received the notification, the notification from (1) is shown to the user on watchOS. In the end, the iOS and watchOS notifications are not consolidated and each remains in its respective notification center. Up to (3) there are no issues. Starting with (4), both iOS and watchOS exhibit a lot of odd behavior. This phenomenon occurs with both local notifications and push notifications. When iOS receives the notification first, there is no problem. The notification for watch received later is processed appropriately, and the watchOS notification is not additionally displayed to the user. Expected proper process Same as above. Same as above. Same as above. The notification in (1) is integrated into the notification in (3). The notification in (3) is alerted to the user immediately. 2 sample projects to reproduce Only the main code is attached. Sample project1: local notifications Swift code for local notification app (iOS, watchOS) - App.swift.txt Sample project2: push notifications This sample project is implemented using Firebase Functions and Firebase Cloud Messaging. Swift code push notification app (iOS, watchOS) - App.swift.txt Server side JavaScript code for FirebaseFunction - index.js.txt Tested devices and OS This phenomenon occurred in both of the following patterns. Pattern 1 Xcode 26.0 iPhone 16 (iOS 26.0) Apple Watch series 10 (watchOS 26.0) Pattern 2 Xcode 16.4 iPhone 11 (iOS 18.6) Apple Watch SE 2nd gen (watchOS 11.6) Question Is this phenomenon a bug? Or is my understanding or implementation incorrect? Feedback Assistant number FB20339772
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Sep ’25
Push Notification Icon Not Updated on Some Devices After App Icon Change
Hi, We recently updated our app icon, but the push notification icon has not been updated on some devices. It still shows the old icon on: • iPhone 16 Pro — iOS 26 • iPhone 14 — iOS 26 • iPad Pro 11” (M4) — iOS 18.6.2 • iPhone 16 Plus — iOS 18.5 After restarting these devices, the push notification icon is refreshed and displays the new version correctly. Could you advise how we can ensure the push notification icon updates properly on all affected devices without requiring users to restart? Thank you.
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2w
Apple Push Notification service server certificate
Do we need this new certificate "SHA-2 Root : USERTrust RSA Certification Authority certificate" if we are using token based authentication with APNs? We are signing the JWT with the private Auth key? Or is the new certificate needed on top of this? We are doing something like this: Dictionary<string, object> payload = new Dictionary<string, object>() { { "iss", teamId }, // Apple Developer Team ID { "iat", unixTimestamp } // Issued-at time }; Dictionary<string, object> header = new Dictionary<string, object>() { { "alg", "ES256" }, { "kid", keyId } // Key ID from Apple Developer portal }; string token = JWT.Encode(payload, privateKey, JwsAlgorithm.ES256, header);
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738
Jan ’25
Notifications False Sucecss Delivery
We operate a social network application, SportsYou with over 3 million monthly active users and are experiencing significant issues with push notification delivery through APNs. We have a large number of users reporting they are not receiving push notifications. Our infrastructure uses AWS SNS integrated with APNs to deliver notifications. However, AWS CloudWatch consistently reports successful delivery (Success response), even though users confirm they never received the notifications. Because we receive success responses from AWS SNS, our system does not attempt to recreate or refresh the device endpoints. This leaves us unable to detect or recover from these delivery failures automatically. This issue is widespread and inconsistent. It affects users across multiple variables including different iOS versions, different device models, and different versions of our application. We cannot identify a clear pattern that would help us isolate the root cause. With millions of active users, even a small percentage of delivery failures represents thousands of users experiencing a degraded service. This is significantly impacting user engagement and satisfaction. We need guidance on how to properly diagnose this issue and ensure reliable notification delivery to our users. Specifically, we'd like to understand why we're receiving success responses when notifications aren't being delivered, and what steps we can take to detect and prevent these failures.
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128
Oct ’25
Rewrite `UNNotificationServiceExtension` sub class into Swift 6 async await notation
I'm trying to rewrite a Swift code to Swift 6 language mode and am stuck with this problem. How do I safely pass the bestAttemptContent and contentHandler to the Task? This is from the UNNotificationServiceExtension subclass. final class NotificationService: UNNotificationServiceExtension { var contentHandler: ((UNNotificationContent) -> Void)? var bestAttemptContent: UNMutableNotificationContent? var customNotificationTask: Task<Void, Error>? override func didReceive(_ request: UNNotificationRequest, withContentHandler contentHandler: @escaping (UNNotificationContent) -> Void) { self.contentHandler = contentHandler bestAttemptContent = (request.content.mutableCopy() as? UNMutableNotificationContent) guard let bestAttemptContent = bestAttemptContent else { invokeContentHandler(with: request.content) return } do { let notificationModel = try PushNotificationUserInfo(data: request.content.userInfo) guard let templatedImageUrl = notificationModel.templatedImageUrlString, let imageUrl = imageUrl(from: templatedImageUrl) else { invokeContentHandler(with: bestAttemptContent) return } setupCustomNotificationTask( imageUrl: imageUrl, bestAttemptContent: bestAttemptContent, contentHandler: contentHandler ) } catch { invokeContentHandler(with: bestAttemptContent) } } // More code private func downloadImageTask( imageUrl: URL, bestAttemptContent: UNMutableNotificationContent, contentHandler: @escaping (UNNotificationContent) -> Void ) { self.customNotificationTask = Task { let (location, _) = try await URLSession.shared.download(from: imageUrl) let desiredLocation = URL(fileURLWithPath: "\(location.path)\(imageUrl.lastPathComponent)") try FileManager.default.moveItem(at: location, to: desiredLocation) let attachment = try UNNotificationAttachment(identifier: imageUrl.absoluteString, url: desiredLocation, options: nil) bestAttemptContent.attachments = [attachment] contentHandler(bestAttemptContent) } } } I tried using the MainActor.run {}, but it just moved the error to that run function. The UNNotificationRequest is not sendable, and I don't think I can make it so. Wrap the setupCustomNotification in a Task will move the errors to the didReceive method. It seems like the consuming keyword will help here, but it leads to a compilation error, even with the latest Xcode (16.2). Any pointers?
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474
Mar ’25
iOS blocks 100% notification for app in the background
I created my app. One of its functionality is receive remote notification in the background (it receives it from Firebase Cloud Messaging via APNS) and replies with device location data. This is "boat tracking and alarm" type of app. It worked well both on my iPhone (where I use the same Apple ID as on developer's account) and on my son's iPad (different Apple ID). After the first review, when app was rejected with some remarks, background remote notifications completely stopped working on my iPhone. It looks like my iPhone put the app in permanent sleep. It never receives the background notifications. It receives them though in 2 case: when I open the app (it is no longer in background) when location is changed (it wakes app in the background). But the app should also respond when the device is stable at the position (I use both: precise and Significant Location Change. In the latter case changes are very rare). Btw, I scheduled a background task, not location, and it also never gets executed, so this workaround does not work. I describe it, so any Apple engineer does not get confused, verifying that these remote notifications reach the device. NO, they never get through when app is in the background (THIS IS THE PROBLEM), not that they are never delivered (the are, in the foreground). And the proof that it is not a problem with the app or remote notification construction is: they work on another drives (iPad) with no issues. Sometimes they are very delayed, sometimes almost instant. But usually they work. they worked the same way on my iPhone (with my developer's Apple ID) before the first rejection, and I haven't messed with messaging functionality since then. Now I am over with the last hope I had. I finally got my app release in App Store. I hoped official version would release some blockade my iOS put on my app. But unfortunately not. Official version works the same way as the test one. It works fine (receiving notifications in the background) on my son's iPad and it does not receive any background notification on my iPhone (100% block rate). Can anyone help me how can I reset my apps limits, the iOS created for my app? It seems that the rejection was a sparkle here - this is just a hint. I can provide any system logs for Apple engineers from both devices (iPhone and iPad) if you would like to check this case.
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325
Sep ’25
invalid_client when invoking https://appleid.apple.com/auth/token
sending the following POST request: ---- HTTP REQUEST ---- POST https://appleid.apple.com/auth/token Headers: Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Body: client_id=au.com.thejlrguy.businesschat&client_secret=eyJhbGciOiJFUzI1NiIsImtpZCI6IktLUDc4MkhGVTcifQ.eyJ...QeDn7ug&grant_type=client_credentials&scope=https%3A%2F%2Fappleid.apple.com Getting the below error: {"error":"invalid_client"} The private key used to sign the JWT was created 24 hours ago.
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86
May ’25
Inconsistent VoIP Push Behavior Post Network Restoration
We are observing unexpected behavior in Apple Push Notification Service (APNS) delivery and would appreciate clarification and guidance. Below is a detailed breakdown of the scenario and related questions. Abbreviations: APNP – Apple Push Notification Provider APNS – Apple Push Notification Service Scenario: User1 is registered on iOS device1. Flight Mode is enabled on iOS device1. User2 initiates a call to User1 (Time t = 0 sec). User2 cancels the outgoing call after 5 seconds (Time t = 5 sec). Flight Mode is disabled on iOS device1 after 20 seconds (Time t = 25 sec). Observation: iOS device1 displays an incoming call notification (CallKit UI) after flight mode is turned off, despite the call being cancelled by User2. This notification disappears automatically after approximately 8–10 seconds. Logic Flow: At time t = 0, our APNP sends a VoIP push (priority) to APNS for the incoming call. Since device1 is in flight mode, APNS cannot deliver the push. At t = 25 sec, after flight mode is turned off, APNS delivers the cached VoIP push to device1. The app takes ~5 seconds to initialize (CSDK setup, SIP registration, etc.). It eventually receives a SIP NOTIFY with state="full" and empty dialog info (indicating no active call). Consequently, the CallKit incoming call is removed after ~8 seconds. Questions: → We set the apns-expiration header to 0, expecting that the VoIP push would not be delivered if the device was unreachable when the push was sent. However, APNS still delivers the push 20–30 seconds later, once the device is back online. Q. Why is the apns-expiration header not respected in this case? → Upon receiving the VoIP push, we require ~10–12 seconds to determine if a visible CallKit notification is still relevant (e.g., by completing SIP registration and checking for active dialogs). Q. Is it acceptable, per Apple guidelines, to intentionally delay showing the CallKit UI (incoming call) for 10–15 seconds after receiving the VoIP push? → Apple documentation states that the priority VoIP push channel should be used only for notifying incoming calls, while regular (non-VoIP) pushes should be used for other updates, including call cancellations. Q. What is the rationale behind discouraging the use of the priority VoIP push channel for call cancellation events? In some cases, immediate cancellation notification is as critical as the initial incoming call. Would Apple consider it acceptable to occasionally use the priority VoIP channel for rare call-cancellation scenarios without risking throttling or suspension? → In our implementation, we send an incoming call notification via the priority VoIP channel. Shortly after, we send a call cancellation notification on the regular push channel, marked with "content-available": 1. We expect this regular push to wake the app (triggering application:didReceiveRemoteNotification:fetchCompletionHandler:), but in practice the app never wakes, and our debug logs inside that delegate method never appear. Q. Under what exact conditions does a "content-available": 1 regular push fail to wake the app when it follows a VoIP push? Are there additional requirements (e.g., background modes, rate limits, power optimizations) that could prevent the delegate from being called? → According to Apple documentation: “APNs stores only one notification per bundle ID. When multiple notifications are sent to the same device for the same bundle ID, APNs keeps only the latest one.” However, in our tests: If a device is offline when APNs receives both: (a) a priority VoIP push for an incoming call, (b) a regular push for call cancellation (same bundle ID), Upon the device reconnecting, APNs still delivers the earlier VoIP push, instead of discarding it and delivering only the most recent (cancellation) notification. Q. Why doesn’t APNs replace the queued VoIP push with the newer regular push when both share the same bundle ID? Is this expected behavior due to channel type differences (VoIP vs. regular), or is there a way to ensure that the latest notification (even if regular) supersedes the earlier VoIP push? We’d appreciate your input or recommendations on handling such delayed pushes and any best practices for VoIP push expiration handling and call UI timing.
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90
Aug ’25
Sending 'notification' risks causing data races
I'm attempting to leverage notifications in an app that is in Swift 6 language mode. I have the following code: func startLocationUpdates() { //if self.manager.authorizationStatus == .notDetermined { // self.manager.requestWhenInUseAuthorization() //} self.logger.info("Starting location updates") Task { do { let updates = CLLocationUpdate.liveUpdates() for try await update in updates { if !self.updatesStarted { break } // End location updates by breaking out of the loop. self.lastUpdate = update if let loc = update.location { self.lastLocation = loc self.isStationary = update.stationary self.count += 1 self.logger.info("Location \(self.count): \(self.lastLocation)") } if lastUpdate!.insufficientlyInUse { let notification = UNNotificationRequest(identifier: "com.example.mynotification", content: notificationContent, trigger: nil) try await UNUserNotificationCenter.current().add(notification) } } } catch { self.logger.error("Could not start location updates") } return } } As an aside, the above is directly taken from the following sample: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/CoreLocation/adopting-live-updates-in-core-location. With Swift 6 language mode enable, this generates a compiler error for the statement: try await UNUserNotificationCenter.current().add(notification) Sending main actor-isolated 'notification' to nonisolated instance method 'add' risks causing data races between nonisolated and main actor-isolated uses How can I fix this?
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548
Feb ’25
Not Receiving Incoming VoIP Push Notifications on iOS 18.4 (React Native App)
Hi Apple Dev Team, We have a React Native application that includes call functionality using PushKit and VoIP notifications. We are using APNS to send the VoIP notifications, and everything has been working smoothly on iOS versions up to 18.3.1. However, after updating to iOS 18.4, we are no longer receiving incoming VoIP push notifications on the device. There have been no code changes related to our PushKit or notification logic — the exact same build continues to work correctly on devices running iOS 18.3.1 and earlier. We're trying to understand if anything has changed in iOS 18.4 that affects VoIP push delivery or registration behavior. Would appreciate any guidance, and happy to share code snippets or configuration if needed. Thanks in advance!
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133
Apr ’25
PKPushRegistry not running in background or when app is killed
self.pushRegistry = [[PKPushRegistry alloc] initWithQueue:dispatch_get_main_queue()]; self.pushRegistry.delegate = self; self.pushRegistry.desiredPushTypes = [NSSet setWithObject:PKPushTypeVoIP]; //处理接收到的VoIP推送 (void)pushRegistry:(PKPushRegistry *)registry didReceiveIncomingPushWithPayload:(PKPushPayload *)payload forType:(PKPushType)type withCompletionHandler:(void(^)(void))completion then we send message from our server or from apple's cloud service: https://icloud.developer.apple.com/dashboard/notifications website services: when app is in foreground,withCompletionHandler wil be called correctly,but when app is in background or has killed ,withCompletionHandler not be called!!! the background fetch、voice over ip is checked in signing & capabilities tabs why?why?why?why?why?why?why?why?why?
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393
Mar ’25
Push Notification Problem
Hello, i'm facing issues, when trying to integrate push notification feature into my app. the following message is shown and I don't know how to fix it: ExportArchive "Runner.app" requires a provisioning profile with the push notifications feature (Encountered error while creating the IPA) Thankful for any help! Best regards
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316
Mar ’25
APNS Notifications not received on macOS Device
Hello Team, We are currently experiencing an issue where some of our devices are not receiving push notifications. We are sending notifications via the Apple Push Notification portal (https://developer.apple.com/notifications/push-notifications-console/) using the following two requests. However, in both cases, the notifications are not being delivered to the devices. Scenario 1 : When we send a request with apns-push-type set to alert, we receive the following error. Request : curl -v --header "authorization: bearer ${AUTHENTICATION_TOKEN}" --header "apns-topic: com.testcompany.sampletest" --header "apns-push-type: alert" --header "apns-priority: 10" --header "apns-expiration: 0" --data '{"aps":{"alert":{"title":"Test Notification Title","subtitle":"Test Notification Sub Title","body":"Test Notification Body"}}}' --http2 https://api.push.apple.com:443/3/device/*devicetoken* Response: { "code": 400, "message": "bad-request", "reason": "The device token is inactive for the specified topic. There is no need to send further pushes to the same device token, unless your application retrieves the same device token.", "requestUuid": "c4ae39b4-87e1-4269-a1e9-163f60ec0385" } Scenario 2 : However, if we send the request with apns-push-type set to background, the request is processed successfully by APNs, but no notification is received on the device. Request : curl -v --header "authorization: bearer ${AUTHENTICATION_TOKEN}" --header "apns-topic: com.testcompany.sampletest" --header "apns-push-type: background" --header "apns-priority: 10" --header "apns-expiration: 0" --data '{"aps":{"alert":{"title":"Test Notification Title","subtitle":"Test Notification Sub Title","body":"Test Notification Body"}}}' --http2 https://api.push.apple.com:443/3/device/*devicetoken* Response: Getting a message that The notification sent successfully but no notification is received on the device. In both cases (with alert and background push types), the push notification does not reach the device. Additionally, when we validated the device token using the APNs Device Token Validator, it appears to be valid and returns the following message. "Device Token is valid for sending Alert & Background push-type notifications in the Production environment" Affected Device: macOS version : MacOS 15.3.1 Processor : Apple M1 Could you please assist me in resolving this issue? Thanks
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181
Oct ’25
How can you tick between live activities?
I have been watching the following moment from wwdc (Design dynamic Live Activities): https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2023/10194/?time=728 It suggest that you should 'tick' between multiple live activities of your app: When you want to show multiple sessions for your app going on at once, consider ticking between the display of them to continue to give users an eye on everything that’s going on. How can I tick between them? More specifically how can I do that when my app is in the background?
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219
Apr ’25