I'm using FamilyActivityPicker to get consent for app/category management, which returns a FamilyActivitySelection object. I serialize this FamilyActivitySelection object (just applicationTokens and categoryTokens) and pass it to my DeviceActivityMonitor extension via App Group UserDefaults. I am using the JSON encoder/decoder over PropertyList (though both seem to exhibit the same behavior). After inspecting the FamilyActivitySelection object immediately after it's returned by FamilyActivityPicker in the main app, the application.bundleIdentifier property is consistently nil for every Application object within selection.applications. Similarly, category.localizedDisplayName is nil for ActivityCategory objects. This happens whether "Select All Apps" is used or if apps/categories are selected individually. I understand that this is the intended behavior due to Apple's user privacy policies. I read on another post that my app can be provided with bundle identifiers and app names within Shield Configuration extensions and Device Activity Report extensions - I'm not sure which ones or how exactly to do this. I am aware that I can use Label(applicationToken) SwiftUI view to display the app name/icon, but this doesn't give programmatic access to the bundleIdentifier string. My app will not log or export these bundleIdentifiers outside of its sandbox. My goal is to create mappings to the FamilyActivitySelection with the publicly accessible bundleIdentifiers. Any guidance, examples, or clarification on the intended workflow for this scenario would be greatly appreciated!

I’m creating an app with the Screen Time API and I would like to know how to make the app show a parental control editing view for parents and a view for child accounts that shows which apps are blocked. How can I do this?

How can I use the Screen Time API to set a restriction for a child account from my app running on the parent’s account?

Hi I'm trying to build a screen time app and the Apple docs and APIs really leave something to be desired. I want to block apps on a schedule. That's it. To do this I need my DeviceActivityMonitorExt to know which apps to block. I need to somehow pass a DeviceActivitySelection from the main app into this DeviceActivityMonitorExt. How can I do this?

Hey there! So, I'm trying to see what I'm able to do with the Device Activity Report Extension, and I have a few questions about the following quote: To protect the user’s privacy, your extension runs in a sandbox. This sandbox prevents your extension from making network requests or moving sensitive content outside the extension’s address space. In particular, what constitutes the address space for this extension? Can I save data to a UserDefaults object that only the extension can access? (Apps like Opal allow the user to label apps as "distracting" and "non-distracting", and I'm wondering how they do that!) From what I've read, I believe it cannot write to a shared app group or model (and I just want to confirm this) It also seems that there's nothing preventing it from reading data from the main app, so I'm just wondering if it's able to read data from an app group or model with no problem. Thanks in advance!

Hello, I have noticed that the ShieldConfiguration is only requested when opening a target app, and never when the application token is moved to a different shield while the target app remains in foreground. This causes problems because many times the wrong ShieldConfiguration is displayed (recycled) instead of requesting a new ShieldConfiguration. This bug has been around since the introduction of the Screen Time API in 2020 and is has not been addressed. Bug reports: FB14237883 FB17902392 Please fix asap!! Not acceptable to have bugs not being addressed for more than 5 years. Most concerning: This is still reproducing on iOS 26 beta 7!! Thanks a lot for your help.

I started monitoring using the following code: deviceActivityCenter.startMonitoring( DeviceActivityName(name), during: makeDailySchedule(), events: events ) Where: DeviceActivitySchedule( intervalStart: DateComponents(hour: 0, minute: 0), intervalEnd: DateComponents(hour: 23, minute: 59), repeats: true, warningTime: nil ) In DeviceActivityMonitor, I read and write data using UserDefaults and keep the logic minimal to ensure the size does not exceed 6MB. However, after a period of time, monitoring continues to fail. Why is this happening? How can I resolve this issue?

I am still struggling to nail down the screen time between monitoring and showing it in a DeviceActivityReport. It's always off by a couple of percentage points, which results in a difference of a couple of minutes between the time shown for my total screen time in DeviceActivityReport and DeviceActivityMonitor with a threshold set for all apps/websites/categories. In the report, I am looping through all segment (there is only 1 segement using .daily segment interval for a given day) then loop through all categories and all apps within each category and sum up all totalActivityDuration for each app. Based on avaiable documentation, that should corrolate to DeviceActivityMonitor threshold but it doesn't. Are there any differences in how these 2 places count screen time? Are there any apps/core ios services which are excluded from DeviceActivityMonitor. Would appreciate any help at all, I'm losing my mind here. My current suspicion is that Apple Developer documentation is counted twice. i.e. this website https://developer.apple.com/documentation/deviceactivity/deviceactivitymonitor shows up in usage as an App with bundleId of apple.developer.wwdc-release and time spent there is counted twice, against this bundleId AND Safari. I don't know why it's not counted as a webdomain.

Hi! For some reason my DeviceActivityReport sometimes fails to load. I've tried setting up a very simple mock views and displaying a report with a simple "Hello world" but even that won't work. It prints the following error message in the terminal but doesn't show anything else or any context as to what has gone wrong. Failed to update the client's configuration: Error Domain=DeviceActivityReportService.ReportViewController.ClientError Code=2 "(null)" It seems like the "makeConfiguration" method for the report isn't even being invoked. That may though just be an issue with printing messages in the extension. Any help on what could be the issue, or even just a message that you're being the same thing would be greatly appreciated!

anyone has the same problem which is that your device activity extension ain't working even tho all the code work perfectly in the console, I setup it in the right way , tried to make schedule and it did the same exact thing when I tried to create usage threshold. anyone know the reason for this bug? here is my extension code import ManagedSettings import FamilyControls import Foundation import OSLog import UserNotifications class MonitoringExtension: DeviceActivityMonitor { private let defaults = UserDefaults(suiteName: "group.com.William.app") private let logger = Logger(subsystem: "com.William.app", category: "MonitoringExtension") override func eventDidReachThreshold(_ event: DeviceActivityEvent.Name, activity: DeviceActivityName) { let activityRaw = activity.rawValue logger.info("Limite atteinte: \(activityRaw)") scheduleNotification(title: "Limite dépassée", body: "Tu as utilisé trop de temps sur \(activityRaw).") guard let data = defaults?.data(forKey: "\(activityRaw)_selection"), let selection = try? JSONDecoder().decode(FamilyActivitySelection.self, from: data) else { logger.warning("Pas de sélection pour \(activityRaw)") return } let store = ManagedSettingsStore() // ← LE SEUL QUI MARCHE store.shield.applications = selection.applicationTokens if !selection.categoryTokens.isEmpty { store.shield.applicationCategories = .specific(selection.categoryTokens) } logger.info("BLOCAGE ACTIF via ManagedSettingsStore.default") } override func intervalDidEnd(for activity: DeviceActivityName) { super.intervalDidEnd(for: activity) let store = ManagedSettingsStore() store.clearAllSettings() // ← Débloque à minuit logger.info("Restrictions levées à la fin de l'intervalle") } private func scheduleNotification(title: String, body: String) { UNUserNotificationCenter.current().requestAuthorization(options: [.alert, .sound]) { granted, _ in guard granted else { return } let content = UNMutableNotificationContent() content.title = title content.body = body let request = UNNotificationRequest(identifier: UUID().uuidString, content: content, trigger: nil) UNUserNotificationCenter.current().add(request) } } }

On pressing the secondary button on my ShieldConfigurationExtension, I remove the shields by setting shields in the named ManagedStore to nil in my ShieldActionExtension. // ShieldActionExtension.swift let store = ManagedSettingsStore() store.shield.applications = nil store.shield.applicationCategories = nil Now after some duration I want to re-apply the shields again for which I do the following: // ShieldActionExtension.swift DispatchQueue.main.asyncAfter(deadline: .now() + unlockDuration) { [weak self] in self?.reapplyShields(for: sessionId, application: application) } private func reapplyShields(for sessionId: String, application: ApplicationToken) { store.shield.applications = Set([application]) } Followed by the completionHandler: // ShieldActionExtension.swift completionHandler(.defer) Now the expectation is ShieldConfigurationExtension should be re-triggered with store.shield.applications = Set([application]), however I see the default iOS screen time shield. This behavior is experience when the blocked app is running in the foreground. However, if I close and re-open the blocked app - the ShieldConfigurationExtension is trigerred again correctly. If I do a completionHandler(.none) instead, the overriden configuration method in ShieldConfigurationExtension is not triggered. How do I make sure ShieldConfigurationExtension is triggered if the blocked app is running in the foreground when the shields are re-applied again?

I am getting this error when I try to show device activity report view by this DeviceActivityReport(appsContext, filter: filter) Attempt to map database failed: permission was denied. This attempt will not be retried. I have taken access by this way. AuthorizationCenter.shared.requestAuthorization(for: .individual)

I am getting this error when I try to show device activity report view by this DeviceActivityReport(appsContext, filter: filter) Attempt to map database failed: permission was denied. This attempt will not be retried. I have taken access by this way. AuthorizationCenter.shared.requestAuthorization(for: .individual) Detailed errors: LaunchServices: store (null) or url (null) was nil: Error Domain=NSOSStatusErrorDomain Code=-54 "process may not map database" UserInfo={NSDebugDescription=process may not map database, _LSLine=72, _LSFunction=_LSServer_GetServerStoreForConnectionWithCompletionHandler} Attempt to map database failed: permission was denied. This attempt will not be retried.

Hi DTS / Apple engineers, We’re attempting to extending our screen time app target to Mac Catalyst. On iOS, FamilyControls works as expected (AuthorizationCenter + FamilyActivityPicker, then ManagedSettings shields + DeviceActivity monitoring/reporting). On Mac Catalyst: The project builds with FamilyControls/DeviceActivity/ManagedSettings capabilities enabled. But attempting to request FamilyControls authorization (or present FamilyActivityPicker) fails at runtime. We see errors similar to: Failed to get service proxy: The connection to service named com.apple.FamilyControlsAgent was invalidated: failed at lookup with error 159 - Sandbox restriction. And our app stays authorizationStatus == .notDetermined, with the request failing. We saw an Apple engineer suggestion to “disable App Sandbox”, but Mac Catalyst apps appear to always be sandboxed, so we can’t disable it. Questions: Is FamilyControls authorization supported on Mac Catalyst today? If so, what entitlement/capability is required specifically for Catalyst/macOS? If FamilyControls auth cannot succeed on Catalyst, does that mean ManagedSettings shields and DeviceActivity monitoring/reporting are effectively unusable on Catalyst (since they depend on that authorization)? Is there an Apple‑recommended approach for a Catalyst “portal” app that mirrors an iOS child device’s restrictions, or is local enforcement on Catalyst intentionally unsupported? Any guidance (and any official docs that clarify current platform support) would be hugely appreciated.

Hi, I’m building an iOS app called SocialLite using Apple’s Screen Time APIs, primarily FamilyControls and ManagedSettings. My goal is to block access to the Instagram app itself, while still allowing the user to receive and see Instagram notifications. Right now, when I apply the shield/block using the Screen Time API, the Instagram app is blocked as expected, but its notifications also appear to be blocked/suppressed at the same time. What I’m trying to achieve: Block the Instagram app from being opened Still allow Instagram notifications to come through normally Current behavior: The app is blocked Notifications are also blocked or no longer visible My question: Is there any supported way with Apple’s Screen Time API / ManagedSettings to shield or block an app while still allowing that app’s notifications? Or are app access and notifications tied together by design when a shield is applied? If this behavior is expected, I’d appreciate confirmation from Apple or guidance on whether there is another supported approach. Thanks.

Similar Issue to FB13556935: On iOS 26.3.1, deviceactivityd produces zero log output and never wakes a DeviceActivityMonitor extension at the scheduled time, even when the schedule is successfully registered. The extension's intervalDidStart(for:) method is never called. Steps to Reproduce: Create an app with a DeviceActivityMonitor extension subclass Add the com.apple.developer.family-controls entitlement to both the main app and extension targets Add a shared App Group entitlement to both targets In the main app, call: let center = DeviceActivityCenter() center.stopMonitoring([.myActivity]) let schedule = DeviceActivitySchedule( intervalStart: DateComponents(hour: 17, minute: 30), intervalEnd: DateComponents(hour: 17, minute: 45), repeats: true ) try center.startMonitoring(.myActivity, during: schedule) Verify registration succeeds: DeviceActivityCenter().activities.contains(.myActivity) returns true Background the app completely and wait for the intervalStart time (5:30 PM in this example) Expected Result: intervalDidStart(for:) is called in the extension process at 5:30 PM. ManagedSettings shields are applied without any user interaction. Actual Result: intervalDidStart(for:) is never called. No extension process is launched. Filtering Console.app for deviceactivityd on the device returns 0 messages — the daemon produces no logs whatsoever despite an active registered schedule. Shields are never applied. Additional Evidence: Third-party apps using DeviceActivity (e.g. Prayer Lock) successfully apply shields at scheduled times on the same device and OS version, confirming the framework is not universally broken Filtering Console.app for the app's bundle ID at the trigger time shows the main app process applying shields via a UNCalendarNotificationTrigger fallback — but no extension process activity DeviceActivityCenter().activities correctly lists the registered activity before and after the trigger time, confirming the schedule registration API is functional Environment: iOS 26.3.1 Physical device (required for FamilyControls) Development-signed build with com.apple.developer.family-controls entitlement provisioned App Group shared between main app and extension targets

Hello, I am the developer of an app called one sec which helps users to spend less time on social media: https://one-sec.app Therefore, we make heavy use of the Screen Time API, and thus ManagedSettings and ShieldActionDelegate. One feature of one sec is the so-called “Doom Scroll Emergency Brake”. This blocks a target app after a certain usage threshold (e.g. 5 minutes) and requires going through an intervention (e.g. breathing exercise) to unlock more time. That added friction makes it very effective in reducing time spent on apps. One thing that is confusing for our users is the way they are prompted to unlock more time, if they want to. They have to: Have Push Notifications enabled for one sec Exempt one sec’s notifications from being delayed by AI prioritization (otherwise they are delayed by ca. 10s) Ensure that push notifications can be delivered during foci. Understand that they have to tap on the notification, which is not very straight-forward because it does not make sense from the user’s UX perspective. This is an artificial limitation of Apple’s screen time framework which has no reason (no security / privacy implications here…). Screenshots of the current flow attached. If would be much more reasonable if there was a new ShieldActionResponse.openParentApp value that can be returned from the completion handler of the ShieldActionDelegate.handle(…) callback. We have seen different apps use private API to achieve this, but we are afraid to do the same to avoid getting banned from the App Store. It would be fair if Apple would level the playground for all apps and offer such an API officially. – Frederik PS: Tracked under FB22347946, FB18846650, FB15500681, FB15079668, FB10393561 (all without responses so far…)

I’m building an iOS app that uses FamilyControls + ManagedSettings + DeviceActivity. Goal: temporarily “unlock” a shielded app for N minutes, then automatically re-apply the shield when the timer expires. What I do: In the main app, when user picks an expiry (e.g. 15 min, 30 min). I start a non-repeating DeviceActivity schedule and remove the app’s ApplicationToken from ManagedSettingsStore().shield.applications. I also store activeUnlockBundleID etc. in an App Group so the DeviceActivityMonitor extension can re-lock at the end. Expected: DeviceActivityMonitor.intervalDidEnd(for:) is invoked when the non-repeating interval ends, and I re-add the token to the shield set. Actual: The app does not re-lock when the interval expires. I added OS logs as well as “debug local notifications” from the DeviceActivityMonitor extension in: init() intervalDidStart intervalDidEnd eventDidReachThreshold None of these logs or notifications ever appear, which suggests the extension is never invoked (or cannot schedule local notifications or OS logs). Environment: Device: iPhone 17 Pro iOS 26.3.1 Xcode 26.4 Running on a physical device Notification permissions for the app: granted App + extensions are in the same App Group entitlement. Extension Info.plist has: NSExtensionPointIdentifier = com.apple.deviceactivity.monitor NSExtensionPrincipalClass = $(PRODUCT_MODULE_NAME).DeviceActivityMonitorExtension Questions: Are there known limitations/requirements for DeviceActivityMonitor callbacks where intervalDidEnd doesn't to fire? Is posting local notifications / OS Logs from a DeviceActivityMonitor extension supported/reliable? If not, what’s the recommended way to verify the extension is invoked? If this looks like a platform bug, should I file Feedback Assistant? If so, what logs/artifacts are most useful?

Hello, I am facing a critical technical blocker regarding the Family Controls (Screen Time API) entitlement for my app extensions. Current Situation: My parent app (com.hayashikento.FocusPact) is already approved for the Family Controls (Distribution) entitlement. However, the associated DeviceActivityMonitorExtension (com.hayashikento.FocusPact.FocusPActMonitor) and ReportExtension (com.hayashikento.FocusPact.ReportExtension) are still pending entitlement approval. Technical Issue: Because the extensions lack the Distribution entitlement, ManagedSettings and DeviceActivity triggers (like intervalWillEndWarning) are ignored by the system when testing via TestFlight or in a non-development environment. As a result, I am unable to verify the core "automatic re-blocking" logic and "usage reporting" features in a real-world scenario. This has completely halted the final QA and TestFlight phase of my project. Requests: Could an Apple engineer verify if these extension IDs can be linked to my existing approved parent app entitlement? Is there a specific process to expedite the "linking" of extensions when the main app is already authorized? App Details: Parent App Bundle ID: com.hayashikento.FocusPact Extension IDs: com.hayashikento.FocusPact.FocusPActMonitor, com.hayashikento.FocusPact.ReportExtension Apple ID (App)6759132649 I have already submitted the web request forms, but the lack of synchronization between the parent app and extensions is preventing my MVP launch. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Hello, I am facing a critical technical blocker regarding the Family Controls (Screen Time API) entitlement for my app extensions. Current Situation: My parent app (com.hayashikento.FocusPact) is already approved for the Family Controls (Distribution) entitlement. However, the associated DeviceActivityMonitorExtension (com.hayashikento.FocusPact.FocusPActMonitor) and ReportExtension (com.hayashikento.FocusPact.ReportExtension) are still pending entitlement approval. Technical Issue: Because the extensions lack the Distribution entitlement, ManagedSettings and DeviceActivity triggers (like intervalWillEndWarning) are ignored by the system when testing via TestFlight or in a non-development environment. As a result, I am unable to verify the core "automatic re-blocking" logic and "usage reporting" features in a real-world scenario. This has completely halted the final QA and TestFlight phase of my project. Requests: Could an Apple engineer verify if these extension IDs can be linked to my existing approved parent app entitlement? Is there a specific process to expedite the "linking" of extensions when the main app is already authorized? App Details: Parent App Bundle ID: com.hayashikento.FocusPact Extension IDs: com.hayashikento.FocusPact.FocusPActMonitor, com.hayashikento.FocusPact.ReportExtension Apple ID (App)6759132649 I have already submitted the web request forms, but the lack of synchronization between the parent app and extensions is preventing my MVP launch. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.