We rely on ApplePaySession.applePayCapabilities() to decide whether to show the Apple Pay button. We use two different merchant IDs for non-prod/prod environments, and encountered a change in behavior where this API now returns different results.
These merchant IDs are generated from a third-party provider Adyen. However, Adyen has informed us that they are unable to identify the root cause of the issue and advised us to seek assistance directly from Apple Pay support.
Timeline
- Last known working date: 13/08/2025
- Issue first noticed: 18/08/2025
Environment Details
- Apple Pay JS API version 1.latest
- Browsers Tested: Third party browsers including Chrome/139.0.0.0, Firefox/141.0
- Browsers with ApplePaySession built-in (like iOS Chrome, iOS Safari, and macOS Safari) are working fine
- Framework Stack: Angular v18.1.3
- (important) no configuration setup in Apple dev account, merchantId is generated from a third-party provider Adyen.
Current Execution Flow:
- Apple Pay JS API script element is injected
<script type="text/javascript" async="" src="https://applepay.cdn-apple.com/jsapi/1.latest/apple-pay-sdk.js"></script>
- Triggers below to check apple pay readiness, different ${merchantId_credential} is used:
await window.ApplePaySession.applePayCapabilities(`${merchantId_credential}`);
(**ApplePaySession is a valid object at this point)
- Observed that different paymentCredentialStatus is returned
// nonprod env
{
"paymentCredentialStatus": "applePayUnsupported" // unexpected
}
// prod env
{
"paymentCredentialStatus": "paymentCredentialStatusUnknown"
}
The same code is executed in each environment and the behaviour was also the same, but has changed since then.
Side notes
By checking the SDK’s internal code, we saw that in third-party browsers it makes an extra call to the following endpoint. Responses from this call also come back differently depending on the merchantId.
When invoking below:
curl -X POST \
https://smp-paymentservices.apple.com/paymentservices/v3/checkStatus/merchant/{merchantId} \
-H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
-d '{
"initiative": "web",
"initiativeContext": "env_specific_domain"
}'
Our non-prod environment returns {"registered":false} while using prod's merchantId and domain it returns {"registered":true}. We thought the issue might be domain-related since the environments are on different domains, but so far, no luck.
The main questions we're looking to resolve are:
- Why did the behavior change at a certain point despite no code changes? How should we approach this investigation, and what specific requests should we be making to the Adyen team?
- Why does the response from the call to https://smp-paymentservices.apple.com/paymentservices/v3/checkStatus/merchant/{merchantId} return different results? Perhaps this could provide a clue regarding the question above?
- We noticed that canMakePayments() is returning true, so we could consider using that as a workaround. Would it be safe to change the source of truth relying on canMakePayments() for displaying Apple Pay?
There is a concern that this issue may also occur in our production environment, so we would appreciate assistance in understanding what is happening and finding a resolution.
