I’m developing an iOS idle game (guild management). To detect manual device time changes that would break progression, I need a trusted “current real-world time” reference.
I’m considering querying Apple’s NTP host time.apple.com, but I couldn’t find any official guidance about whether third-party apps may use time.apple.com directly (acceptable use, rate limits, whether it’s discouraged, etc.). Apple Developer Support couldn’t provide info and suggested asking on the forums.
Questions: 1. Is it permitted for a third-party iOS app to query time.apple.com via NTP/SNTP (Yes/No or conditional)? 2. If permitted, are there any published or recommended constraints (rate limits, caching, prohibited patterns, commercial app considerations)? 3. If not permitted / not recommended, what is the recommended alternative approach (run our own time service, use public NTP pool, or any Apple-recommended mechanism)? 4. If there is any official document / policy covering this, could you point me to it?
For context: I do not need sub-second accuracy and I do not intend high-frequency polling. If implemented at all, it would be very low frequency (e.g., first launch + once per 24h) with caching and graceful fallback on failure. My main goal is policy clarity rather than implementation details.
I’m not aware of any official documentation about time.apple.com. Given that, you have to treat it like an implementation detail.
It sounds like your app really needs trusted timestamps. That is, if the time service went away, your app would cease to function properly. Given that, I recommend that you use a time service that’s documented to be appropriate for your use case, or something that you run yourself.
Share and Enjoy
—
Quinn “The Eskimo!” @ Developer Technical Support @ Apple
let myEmail = "eskimo" + "1" + "@" + "apple.com"