iOS App Distribution

In the last part of the course, we focused on the minimum needed to get an app on the store. This involved getting a developer account, creating an app record, filling out metadata, and then letting Xcode push your app to the store for you.

Let’s back up a bit though, and talk about some other things that can happen before you app gets released. First, there are a few different internal distribution methods that you can use to distribute your app to a limited set of people before it reaches the App Store.

You’ll learn about those methods, and spend a little more time talking about Ad Hoc distribution. With this method, you can place your app on your website and allow a limited set of users to download and install it for testing.

Another method that technically puts your app on the store, but not to the general public is Unlisted publishing. You’ll learn why you might want to use this method and what advantages it provides.

The Ad Hoc method is just one way to get your app into the hands of testers. The other is to use TestFlight, Apple’s test platform. You can get your app to thousands of testers before it goes to the store, and get crash reports and feedback through App Store Connect.

As you can see, this part of the course is helping you with a very important part of development - user testing! Before we get to that though, let’s talk about some internal distribution methods, which we’ll do in the next episode.