ActivityKit

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Help people keep track of tasks and events that they care about with Live Activities on the Lock Screen, the Dynamic Island, and in StandBy.

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Background scanning for Bluetooth advertisements with LiveActivities on ios26
Hi, I am trying to understand if I am able to get bluetooth scanning for advertisements (no service UUID) when the app is moved into the background and the screen goes to sleep. I am using swift on ios26.2 with a bluetooth class that uses the standard centralManager.scanForPeripherals to listen for particular Beacons. Testing on a real iPhone 15 this works fine whilst in the foreground, and also when on the lock screen. I am trying to get this to continue working in the background when the black screen sleep mode is on. I have the bluetooth 'Uses Bluetooth LE accessories' in the background modes (as well as Audio, Airplay..) and the necessary Bluetooth peripheral usage description, bluetooth always usage descriptions in info.plist. I launch a LiveActivity whilst the app is in the foreground and bluetooth has started scanning. From my understanding of core bluetooth with ios26 the LiveActivity should allow the scan to continue (without service UUIds and aggressive throttling) whilst the app is in the background. Well this seems to work fine.. if I press the side button the phone goes to the Lock Screen, and whilst on the Lock Screen the bluetooth is scanning fine and receiving beacon data. Similarly if the app is sent to the background behind a different foreground app it also works. As soon as the screen goes to sleep however (after only a few seconds of inactivity on the Lock Screen) then all bluetooth scanning stops. If I click back on the screen and bring the Lock Screen up, then scanning resumes again. Now is it possible to continue the scanning whilst the phone is in sleep mode (i.e. black screen)? Are there any additional acceptable steps to make the bluetooth scanning continue when the screen has gone to sleep. Or is it part of the design with core bluetooth that the 'continues in the background' feature only applies to the lock screen and when other active apps are brought to the foreground on an open phone. I want to understand the limitations of what can be achieved so I am not chasing unachievable objectives. Thanks
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7h
Local Updates to Live Activities ignored after push update
I'm building out a live activity that has a button which is meant to update the content state of the Live Activity. It calls a LiveActivityIntent that runs in the app process. The push server starts my live activity and the buttons work just fine. I pass the push token back to the server for further updates and when the next update is pushed by the server the buttons no longer work. With the debugger I'm able to verify the app intent code runs and passes the updated state to the activity. However the activity never updates or re-renders. There are no logs in Xcode or Console.app that indicates what the issue could be or that the update is ignored. I have also tried adding the frequent updates key to my plist with no change. I'm updating the live activity in the LiveActivityIntent like this: public func perform() async throws -> some IntentResult { let activities = Activity<WidgetExtensionAttributes>.activities for activity in activities { let currentState = activity.content.state let currentIndex = currentState.pageIndex ?? 0 let maxIndex = max(0, currentState.items.count - 1) let newIndex: Int if forward { newIndex = min(currentIndex + 1, maxIndex) } else { newIndex = max(currentIndex - 1, 0) } var newState = currentState newState.pageIndex = newIndex await activity.update( ActivityContent( state: newState, staleDate: nil ), alertConfiguration: nil, timestamp: Date() ) } return .result() } To sum up: Push to start -> tap button on activity -> All good! Push to start -> push update -> tap button -> No good...
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Push-to-Start Live Activity Background Task Issue After App Termination
Desired Behavior I want the app to be able to handle multiple Push-to-Start notifications even when it is completely terminated. Each Live Activity should: Be successfully displayed upon receiving a Push-to-Start notification. Trigger background tasks to send its update token to the server, regardless of the time interval between notifications. Problem I am facing an issue with iOS Live Activities when using Push-to-Start notifications to trigger Live Activities in an app that has been completely terminated. Here’s the detailed scenario: When the app is completely terminated and I send the first Push-to-Start notification: The Live Activity is successfully displayed. didFinishLaunchingWithOptions` is triggered, and background tasks execute correctly, including sending the update token to the server. When I send consecutive Push-to-Start notifications in quick succession (e.g., within a few seconds or minutes): Both notifications successfully display their respective Live Activities. Background tasks are executed correctly for both notifications. However, when there is a longer interval (e.g., 10 minutes) between two Push-to-Start notifications: The first notification works perfectly—it displays the Live Activity, triggers didFinishLaunchingWithOptions, and executes background tasks. The second notification successfully displays the Live Activity but fails to execute any background tasks, such as sending the update token to the server. My HypothesisI suspect that iOS might impose a restriction where background runtime for Push-to-Start notifications can only be granted once within a certain time frame after the app has been terminated. Any insights into why this issue might be occurring or how to ensure consistent background task execution for multiple Push-to-Start notifications would be greatly appreciated!
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Intended Flow of Invalidating the pushToStartToken When User Logs Out
Hi, we start and update Live Activities with ActivityKit push notifications in our app, but want to do so only if the user is logged in. Therefore we only send the pushToStartToken to the server when a user logs in (or when the token changed and the user is still logged in.) When the user logs out, we remove that start token from our server so that no LA can be started while the app is in the logged out state. This means that the logout isn't happening immediately but is waiting for that deletion request to succeed. This could also fail and lead to the use rnot being able to log out, e.g. if the user has no internet access. If that deletion request would be fire and forget, we would end up in a state where the server still has the token and might start LAs without any user being logged in. The token flow for Remote Push Notifications is different, on the other hand: requesting a token asynchronously via UIApplication.shared.registerForRemoteNotifications() but invalidating it synchronously (at least from the app's perspective) on logout via UIApplication.shared.unregisterForRemoteNotifications(), which makes it way easier for us to make sure the app does not get notifications when no user is logged in. We're wondering if we're just holding it wrong or if our way of handling the LA token deletion is indeed the intended one?
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Live Activity – crashes on ActivityAuthorizationInfo() and Activity.activities
Hey! I'm working on enabling remotely started live activities. I'm running into 2 crashes: Upon initializing ActivityAuthorizationInfo Upon calling Activity<...>.activities array Both stack traces look like this: 0 libsystem_kernel.dylib +0xce0 _mach_msg2_trap 1 libsystem_kernel.dylib +0x4398 _mach_msg2_internal 2 libsystem_kernel.dylib +0x42b4 _mach_msg_overwrite 3 libsystem_kernel.dylib +0x40fc _mach_msg 4 libdispatch.dylib +0x1cc04 __dispatch_mach_send_and_wait_for_reply 5 libdispatch.dylib +0x1cfa4 _dispatch_mach_send_with_result_and_wait_for_reply 6 libxpc.dylib +0x107ec _xpc_connection_send_message_with_reply_sync 7 BoardServices +0xaea8 -[BSXPCServiceConnectionMessage _sendWithMode:] 8 BoardServices +0x17938 -[BSXPCServiceConnectionMessage sendSynchronouslyWithError:] 9 BoardServices +0xeef0 ___71+[BSXPCServiceConnectionProxy createImplementationOfProtocol:forClass:]_block_invoke They happen to a limited number of users, but not insignificant. Most are on iOS 18.6.2 and iOS 26.1, but there are others in the mix. I don't have a repro myself. It looks like the main thread gets blocked after we receive no response from these ActivityKit APIs. Both of these are called inside application:didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:. For ActivityAuthorizationInfo, we need the app to communicate with the server whether the user has live activities enabled; hence, calling this object's init as early as possible in the app. For activities array, I'd like to do some logging whenever the live activity is started or ended (for example, if activities array no longer contains any activities, we can log the activity as dismissed). For this logging to happen, as far as I understand, it has to happen inside didFinishLaunchingWithOptions since this is the only method being called upon the terminated app receiving background runtime when the live activity starts/ends remotely. After some research, one potential reason is ActivityKit APIs are just not ready to return values via xpc connection at app startup, so moving these methods to applicationDidBecomeActive could resolve the problem. That's fine for ActivityAuthorizationInfo init, but for accessing activities, there is no other place in the lifecycle to see if an activity has been dismissed (especially in the scenario where app is terminated, so we get only 30 seconds ish of background runtime). Curious if anyone has run into this or has any insights into ActivityKit API behavior.
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1w
Live Activity triggered by AlarmKit remains as an empty state
I configured my app to show a Live Activity when an alarm rings using AlarmKit. However, if I dismiss the Live Activity by tapping somewhere other than the X button, and then long-press the Dynamic Island, a new Live Activity appears that is long but contains no information. Currently, the only way I can remove this empty Live Activity is to press the X button while the alarm is in the snooze state. Pressing the X button on the initial alarm does not remove it. Is there any way to prevent this behavior or properly handle / clean up this empty Live Activity?
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In the context of Live Activity, when app is launched into background due to some callback, should you wrap your work with background tasks?
I'm specifically focused on Live Activity, but I think this is somewhat a general question. The app could get a few callbacks when: There's a new payload (start, update, end) There's a new token (start, update) There's some other lifecycle event (stale, dismissed) Assuming that the user didn't force kill the app, would the app get launched in all these scenarios? When OS launches the app for a reason, should we wrap our tasks with beginBackgroundTask or that's unnecessary if we're expecting our tasks to finish within 30 seconds? Or the OS may sometimes be under stress and give you far less time (example 3 seconds) and if you're in slow internet, then adding beginBackgroundTask may actually come in handy?
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Can LiveActivityIntent open the app when tapping a Live Activity button on Lock Screen & Dynamic Island expanded view?
I’m implementing a Live Activity that shows some text and a button. When the user taps the button, I want to open the host app. What I’ve done so far: Implemented a LiveActivityIntent to handle the button tap. The intent is triggered successfully. However, the app does not open by using deep link/universal app link. From what I can tell, LiveActivityIntent seems limited to system/background execution and doesn’t bring the app to the foreground. Questions: Is it possible for a LiveActivityIntent to open the app? Is this behavior a documented/intentional limitation? If not supported, is using a Universal Link or deep link the recommended solution for opening the app from a Live Activity button? Any official clarification or recommended best practice would be helpful.
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How can you update a Live Activity without hitting "Allow"?
(I truly appreciate all the responses you all have written for me :bow: ) I was under the assumption that for Live Activity, in order for you to be able to update the Activity, you need an update token. And for the OS to issue you the update token, user must hit the "Allow" from the lock screen. However based on these screenshots it seems that you don't need to hit "Allow" to be able to update the Live Activity. Live Activity was updated — even without the user hitting "Allow" So now I'm wondering if: Is hitting Allow required for the update token to get issued? Or that assumption is incorrect? In our tests (when connected to Proxyman, the OS emits the update token after user hits "Allow" / "Always Allow") If you don't hit allow, are there alternate ways to update the Live Activity without having the update token? I'm guessing you could set a short stale time and then when the OS launches the app in the background you query the server and then update the Live Activity. Is that a worthy approach? I also noticed that the "The Philly Inquirer" App has 'Background App Refresh" enabled, but this happened in 2 minutes. In our architecture assessments, after reviewing Apple's docs on 'Background Processing", we didn't think of it as a viable option, because it can't guarantee if the OS is given time in the next 2 minutes or 10 hours later when the phone is getting charged again. Are any of these workarounds viable or are there alternate approaches? Our requirement is: be able to use Live Activity between 2-72hrs after app install. (I mention this because perhaps Apple may impost some restrictions for new installs) be able to update an active Live Activity within 1-2 minutes after it has began.
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Dec ’25
iOS26 Live Activity always display in Dark Mode
Hi, We design a Live Activity for our app.We find that in iOS26 system, the widget can not display the correct system display model(Light mode or dark mode), always display with dark mode. When our app run in other system ,such as iOS 17, iOS18 ,it work fine. I find other developer had post a topic three month ago , but it seems there is not any new response about the feedback. https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/799684?answerId=857377022#857377022 Anyone have idea? Thanks . Below is my code template: struct BroadcastLiveActivityBackgroundView: View { @Environment(\.colorScheme) var colorScheme: ColorScheme var body:some View { LinearGradient( stops: [ Gradient.Stop(color: LiveActivityColor.backgroundColors(self.colorScheme).last!, location: 0.00), Gradient.Stop(color: LiveActivityColor.backgroundColors(self.colorScheme).first!, location: 1.00), ], startPoint: UnitPoint(x: 1, y: 0), endPoint: UnitPoint(x: 0.82, y: 1.11) ) } }
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Dec ’25
How to disable highlight state on Link in LA widget
I am working on a Live Activity widget. In it, I want some of the elements to open different deeplink URLs. I have found that assigning multiple widgetURL doesn't work, only one of the URLs gets opened no matter where you tap. I also found that Buttons don't seem to do anything, tapping them actually just open my app as if I just tapped a naked Live Activity. I have found that really only Link elements work if I want to open different URLs upon tapping different elements. And Links are cool and fine, but I am seeing that on tap, my elements become tinted... As in, there is a highlighted state, and it makes the elements inside blue. I have tried to use button style API on a link, but it didn't work. How can I disable the highlighted state for a Link element in a live activity widget?
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Dec ’25
Push to start live activities with channelIds do not work for a second time without re-installing the app.
We have implemented live activities with broadcast notification using channels. It has been working without a problem for the last 6-8 months. Now we want to upgrade it by starting the channel based live activity via push notification. Whenever I try locally with development channels there isnt any problem regarding to starting live activity. When we go production on Testflight or App Store it doesn't work after first successful push even though user enters the app and send the new push to start token to our server and we are using the latest token we receive. We couldn't go further with debugging since it works perfectly fine the client when tried locally and we know we can send successful pushes as well since the metrics shows 12% success but we do not actually know what happened to remaining 88%. Every apns request return success with 200 and empty body. How can we further debug this issue. Or is this a common problem, if so, is there any possible solution to this. As far as we see, token goes to our server so we have the latest token all the time and this whole logic doesn't work without deleting and reinstalling the app.
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Dec ’25
Flutter iOS Widget Extension – CodeSign Failed (ActivityKit entitlement missing, cannot enable in Identifiers)
Hello everyone, I am developing a Flutter iOS application that includes a Widget Extension + Live Activity (ActivityKit). The project runs successfully on the iOS simulator when launched directly from Xcode, but it cannot be signed properly via Flutter and I cannot upload the build to App Store Connect due to the following CodeSign error: Command CodeSign failed with a nonzero exit code Provisioning profile "…" doesn't include the entitlement: com.apple.developer.activitykit.allow-third-party-activity This error never goes away no matter what I try. And the main problem is that my App ID does NOT show any ActivityKit or Live Activity capability in the Apple Developer portal → Identifiers → App ID. So I cannot enable it manually. However: Xcode requires this entitlement Flutter requires this entitlement When I add the entitlement manually in the .entitlements file, Xcode says: “This entitlement must be enabled in your Developer account. It cannot be added manually.” So I am stuck in a loop where: Apple Developer portal does not show ActivityKit capability Xcode demands the ActivityKit entitlement Signing fails App Store upload fails And Live Activity is a critical feature of my app What I have already done ✔ “Automatically manage signing” is enabled ✔ Correct Team is selected for both Runner and the Widget Extension ✔ Bundle IDs are correct: com.yksbuddy.app com.yksbuddy.app.TimerWidgetExtension ✔ Deleted Derived Data completely ✔ Tried removing all ActivityKit-related entitlement keys manually ✔ Deleted Pods, reinstalled, rebuilt ✔ App Group settings match between Runner and Extension ✔ The same Live Activity code works perfectly in a clean Xcode-only project ✔ But fails only inside a Flutter project structure ✔ Xcode builds & runs on simulator, but App Store upload always fails due to missing entitlement Core Problem: In my Apple Developer “Identifiers → App ID” page, the Live Activity / ActivityKit capability does NOT appear at all, so I cannot enable: Live Activities ActivityKit Third-party activity entitlement Without being able to enable this capability, I cannot create a valid provisioning profile that includes: com.apple.developer.activitykit.allow-third-party-activity Flutter + Xcode insists this entitlement must exist, but Apple Developer portal does not give any option to enable it.
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Dec ’25
BadDeviceToken Error in Live Activities
Hello everyone, I’m currently receiving feedback from clients in a production environment who are encountering a BadDeviceToken error with Live Activities, which is preventing their states from updating. However, for other clients, the token is working fine and everything functions as expected. I’m collaborating with the back-end developers to gather more information about this issue, but the only log message we’re seeing is: Failed to send a push, APNS reported an error: BadDeviceToken I would greatly appreciate it if anyone could provide some insight or information on how to resolve this issue.
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Nov ’25
Live Activities Push-to-Start flows
Good morning, We are implementing Live Activities in a push-to-start flow. We wrap the listener for push to start tokens in a high priority task: if ptsListenerTask == nil || ptsListenerTask?.isCancelled == true { ptsListenerTask = Task(priority: .high) { [weak self] in for await pushToken in Activity<LiveAuctionAttributes>.pushToStartTokenUpdates { //Send token to back-end } } I've tried a few variations of this and they work well on most devices. I have seen a couple of devices that refuse to issue a push to start token. The user will have logging for the init flow and starting the PTS listener then the logs just go silent, nothing happens. One thing that seemed to work was getting the user to start a Live Activity manually (from our debugging tool) then the PTS token gets issued. This is not very reliable and working a mock live activity into the flow for obtaining a PTS token is a poor solution. Is anyone else seeing this and is there a known issue with obtaining PTS tokens? Thanks! Brad
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Nov ’25
How to Update a Live Activity from a Widget Extension When Local Notifications Are Active?
I’m manipulating some data inside a widget extension, and at the same time there is an active Live Activity (Dynamic Island / Lock Screen). How can I update the Live Activity’s local notification when the data changes? I tried accessing the current activity using Activity.activities, but it seems that this API is not accessible from inside the widget extension. What is the correct way to refresh or update the Live Activity in this case?
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Nov ’25
Live Activity (Dynamic Island) suddenly stopped working without code changes
Hi everyone, I am encountering an issue where my Live Activity (Dynamic Island) suddenly became invalid and failed to launch. It was working perfectly before, and I haven't modified any code since then. My Environment: Xcode: 26.1.1 Device iOS: 26.1 Testing: I also tested on iOS 18, but the Live Activity fails to start there as well. Here is my code: Live Activity Manager (Start/Update/End): func startLiveActivity() { // Initial static data let attributes = SimpleIslandAttributes(name: "Test Order") // Initial dynamic data let initialContentState = SimpleIslandState(message: "Preparing...") // Adapting for iOS 16.2+ new API (Content) let activityContent = ActivityContent(state: initialContentState, staleDate: nil) do { let activity = try Activity.request( attributes: attributes, content: activityContent, pushType: nil // Set to nil as remote push updates are not needed ) print("Live Activity Started ID: \(activity.id)") } catch { print("Failed to start: \(error.localizedDescription)") } } // 2. Update Live Activity func updateLiveActivity() { Task { let updatedState = SimpleIslandState(message: "Delivering 🚀") let updatedContent = ActivityContent(state: updatedState, staleDate: nil) // Iterate through all active Activities and update them for activity in Activity<SimpleIslandAttributes>.activities { await activity.update(updatedContent) print("Update") } } } // 3. End Live Activity func endLiveActivity() { Task { let finalState = SimpleIslandState(message: "Delivered ✅") let finalContent = ActivityContent(state: finalState, staleDate: nil) for activity in Activity<SimpleIslandAttributes>.activities { // dismissalPolicy: .default (immediate), .after(...) (delayed), .immediate (no animation) await activity.end(finalContent, dismissalPolicy: .default) print("End") } } } The Models (Shared between App and Widget Extension): // 1. Define State (Dynamic data, changes over time, e.g., remaining delivery time) public struct SimpleIslandState: Codable, Hashable { var message: String } // 2. Define Attributes (Static data, constant after start, e.g., Order ID) public struct SimpleIslandAttributes: ActivityAttributes { public typealias ContentState = SimpleIslandState var name: String // e.g., "My Order" } The Widget Code: // // SimpleIslandWidget.swift // ReadyGo // // Created by Tang Yu on 2025/11/19. // import WidgetKit import SwiftUI import ActivityKit struct SimpleIslandWidget: Widget { var body: some WidgetConfiguration { ActivityConfiguration(for: SimpleIslandAttributes.self) { context in // UI shown on the Lock Screen VStack { Text("Lock Screen Notification: \(context.state.message)") } .activityBackgroundTint(Color.cyan) .activitySystemActionForegroundColor(Color.black) } dynamicIsland: { context in // Inside Widget Extension DynamicIsland { // Expanded Region DynamicIslandExpandedRegion(.center) { Text("Test") // Pure text only } } compactLeading: { Text("L") // Pure text only } compactTrailing: { Text("R") // Pure text only } minimal: { Text("M") // Pure text only } } } } Additional Info: This is the minimal code setup I created for testing, but even this basic version is failing. I have set NSSupportsLiveActivities (Supports Live Activities) to YES (true) in the Info.plist for both the Main App and the Widget Extension. Has anyone experienced this? Any help would be appreciated.
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Nov ’25
Live Activity Shows Only Black Dynamic Island UI (No Content Rendering) — Widget Extension Receives Updates but SwiftUI UI Is Empty
Hi all, very new "developer" trying to build my own app. The app works, just trying to improve it. I’m implementing a Live Activity in a widget extension (Swift/SwiftUI) for an app built with Flutter as the host app. ActivityKit is functioning correctly—activities start, update, and end normally, and the widget extension receives all state updates. However, the Live Activity UI renders as a completely black capsule (both compact and expanded Dynamic Island, as well as the Lock Screen presentation). The system shows the Live Activity container, but none of the SwiftUI content displays. Verified so far: ActivityAttributes contains at least one stored property (previously empty). ContentState fully Codable + Hashable. All Dynamic Island regions return visible test UI (Text/Image). No .containerBackground() usage. Added explicit .activityBackgroundTint() + system foreground colors. All Swift files included in widget extension target. No runtime errors, no decode failures, no SwiftUI logs. Widget previews work. Clean build, app reinstall, device reboot. Entitlements and Info.plist appear valid. Problem: The widget extension returns a completely black UI on-device, despite valid SwiftUI content in ActivityConfiguration. The Live Activity “shell” renders, so the activity is recognized, but the widget’s view hierarchy is visually empty. Question: Under what conditions would a widget extension produce a black, empty UI for a Live Activity even when ActivityKit, previews, and the SwiftUI layout are correct? Are there known cases where: Widget extension Info.plist misconfiguration, Incorrect background/tint handling, Rendering issues in Dynamic Island, Host app integrations (Flutter), Or extension isolation issues cause valid SwiftUI to fail to render in a Live Activity? Any guidance on deeper debugging steps or known system pitfalls would be appreciated.
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Nov ’25