We’re sending PTT notifications from our server and are receiving HTTP 403 from APNs for certain phones with the reason field BadEnvironmentKeyInToken. I can’t find this reason documented in Apple’s public error list. I’d like to confirm what this error specifically means and how to resolve it. Any guidance or clarification would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. Here is the document I was referring to. https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/RemoteNotificationsPG/CommunicatingwithAPNs.html

Hello all 👋 We're developing an app for families with neurodivergent members (primarily autistic children) and have run into a critical reliability issue with silent push notifications that breaks core functionality. Our current implementation: When a caretaker updates the person's daily routine/schedule in our system, we send a silent push notification to the user's device. The app wakes, connects to our server, downloads the updated schedule, and creates/updates local notifications for upcoming activities. The problem: Because the app is rarely/never directly interacted with by the end user (the child doesn't open the app - caregivers configure it on their behalf), silent push notifications get progressively throttled and eventually stop being delivered entirely. This means schedule changes made by caregivers never reach the device, breaking the app's core value proposition. Uninstalling and reinstalling doesn't reset the throttling state Questions: Is there any way to reset or mitigate throttling for devices that legitimately need background updates but have low or no user interaction? This is an accessibility use case where the end user (child) doesn't interact with the app, but the app must reliably receive updates. Would switching to regular (visible) push notifications avoid this throttling even if the app is not interacted with? We already have Critical Alerts entitlement, but for regular updates we're worried that the "CRITICAL ALERT" banner will be too upsetting for the child. Is there any exception process for accessibility apps to change the way Critical Alerts are presented? For neurodivergent individuals, predictable routines are essential. When schedule updates don't reach their device, it can cause significant distress. This is a genuine accessibility need, not a "nice-to-have" feature. Any guidance from Apple engineers or developers who've solved similar challenges would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Issue: I am making an application that stores data locally from notifications fired from the server. Everything works fine in the foreground but the background is having problems with not being triggered when notifications are fired. So we tried firing 2 notifications at the same time, including default and silent types. But the problem continues to arise on ios 18, when firing multiple times like that, the trigger is not handling all notifications, leading to data loss. I tried on ios 15 and it worked fine. Environment: Device or Simulator: Iphone 11 pro max (iOS 18.3.2 Steps to Reproduce: Open app, allow received notification. Move app to background mode or terminate app. Sent 2 notifications: a. Default notification payload: { "aps": { "content-available": 1 }, ”notification”: {…}, “alert”: {..}, “data": "some_value" } b. Silent notification payload: { "aps": { "content-available": 1 }, ”data": "some_value" } What I've Tried: Trigger notification in function: application(_:didReceiveRemoteNotification:fetchCompletionHandler:) Handle write data to local storage in above function, put it in background thread also. Thanks in advance!

We operate a social network application, SportsYou with over 3 million monthly active users and are experiencing significant issues with push notification delivery through APNs. We have a large number of users reporting they are not receiving push notifications. Our infrastructure uses AWS SNS integrated with APNs to deliver notifications. However, AWS CloudWatch consistently reports successful delivery (Success response), even though users confirm they never received the notifications. Because we receive success responses from AWS SNS, our system does not attempt to recreate or refresh the device endpoints. This leaves us unable to detect or recover from these delivery failures automatically. This issue is widespread and inconsistent. It affects users across multiple variables including different iOS versions, different device models, and different versions of our application. We cannot identify a clear pattern that would help us isolate the root cause. With millions of active users, even a small percentage of delivery failures represents thousands of users experiencing a degraded service. This is significantly impacting user engagement and satisfaction. We need guidance on how to properly diagnose this issue and ensure reliable notification delivery to our users. Specifically, we'd like to understand why we're receiving success responses when notifications aren't being delivered, and what steps we can take to detect and prevent these failures.

We operate a social network application, SportsYou with over 3 million monthly active users and are experiencing significant issues with push notification delivery through APNs. We have a large number of users reporting they are not receiving push notifications. Our infrastructure uses AWS SNS integrated with APNs to deliver notifications. However, AWS CloudWatch consistently reports successful delivery (Success response), even though users confirm they never received the notifications. Because we receive success responses from AWS SNS, our system does not attempt to recreate or refresh the device endpoints. This leaves us unable to detect or recover from these delivery failures automatically. This issue is widespread and inconsistent. It affects users across multiple variables including different iOS versions, different device models, and different versions of our application. We cannot identify a clear pattern that would help us isolate the root cause. With millions of active users, even a small percentage of delivery failures represents thousands of users experiencing a degraded service. This is significantly impacting user engagement and satisfaction. We need guidance on how to properly diagnose this issue and ensure reliable notification delivery to our users. Specifically, we'd like to understand why we're receiving success responses when notifications aren't being delivered, and what steps we can take to detect and prevent these failures.

I am an iOS development engineer. Recently, I updated the Xcode version to 16.1 (16B40) and updated my debugging device (iPhone 15) to iOS 18.1.1. However, I found that I could not respond to the delegate method. I confirmed that my code, certificate, Xcode settings, and network environment had not changed. Simply executing application.registerForRemoteNotifications() in func application(_ application: UIApplication, didFinishLaunchingWithOptions launchOptions: [UIApplication.LaunchOptionsKey: Any]?) -> Bool did not receive a response(didRegisterForRemoteNotificationsWithDeviceToken or didFailToRegisterForRemoteNotificationsWithError ). In the same environment, when I switched to another device for debugging (iOS 17.0.3), the delegate method would respond. I really don't know what to do, I hope someone can help me, I would be very grateful. Please note: Everything is normal when using devices before iOS 18.1.1 version

When subscription renewing , can do purchase_date faster than notification_date quickly? I received my app user purchase notification this purchase date is 2025-08-31 06:42:54(UTC) but notification date is 2025-08-30 22:45:01(UTC) how can you do this? I can't understand it please let me explain

Hello Team, We are currently experiencing an issue where some of our devices are not receiving push notifications. We are sending notifications via the Apple Push Notification portal (https://developer.apple.com/notifications/push-notifications-console/) using the following two requests. However, in both cases, the notifications are not being delivered to the devices. Scenario 1 : When we send a request with apns-push-type set to alert, we receive the following error. Request : curl -v --header "authorization: bearer ${AUTHENTICATION_TOKEN}" --header "apns-topic: com.testcompany.sampletest" --header "apns-push-type: alert" --header "apns-priority: 10" --header "apns-expiration: 0" --data '{"aps":{"alert":{"title":"Test Notification Title","subtitle":"Test Notification Sub Title","body":"Test Notification Body"}}}' --http2 https://api.push.apple.com:443/3/device/*devicetoken* Response: { "code": 400, "message": "bad-request", "reason": "The device token is inactive for the specified topic. There is no need to send further pushes to the same device token, unless your application retrieves the same device token.", "requestUuid": "c4ae39b4-87e1-4269-a1e9-163f60ec0385" } Scenario 2 : However, if we send the request with apns-push-type set to background, the request is processed successfully by APNs, but no notification is received on the device. Request : curl -v --header "authorization: bearer ${AUTHENTICATION_TOKEN}" --header "apns-topic: com.testcompany.sampletest" --header "apns-push-type: background" --header "apns-priority: 10" --header "apns-expiration: 0" --data '{"aps":{"alert":{"title":"Test Notification Title","subtitle":"Test Notification Sub Title","body":"Test Notification Body"}}}' --http2 https://api.push.apple.com:443/3/device/*devicetoken* Response: Getting a message that The notification sent successfully but no notification is received on the device. In both cases (with alert and background push types), the push notification does not reach the device. Additionally, when we validated the device token using the APNs Device Token Validator, it appears to be valid and returns the following message. "Device Token is valid for sending Alert & Background push-type notifications in the Production environment" Affected Device: macOS version : MacOS 15.3.1 Processor : Apple M1 Could you please assist me in resolving this issue? Thanks

We have an app in Swift that uses push notifications. It has a deployment target of iOS 15.0 I originally audited our app for iOS 26 by building it with Xcode 26 beta 3. At that point, all was well. Our implementation of application:didRegisterForRemoteNotificationsWithDeviceToken was called. But when rebuilding the app with beta 4, 5 and now 6, that function is no longer being called. I created a simple test case by creating a default iOS app project, then performing these additional steps: Set bundle ID to our app's ID Add the Push Notifications capability Add in application:didRegisterForRemoteNotificationsWithDeviceToken: with a print("HERE") just to set a breakpoint. Added the following code inside application:didFinishLaunchingWithOptions: along with setting a breakpoint on the registerForRemoteNotifications line: UNUserNotificationCenter.current().requestAuthorization(options: [.badge, .alert, .sound]) { granted, _ in DispatchQueue.main.async { UIApplication.shared.registerForRemoteNotifications() } } Building and running with Xcode 26 beta 6 (17A5305f) generates these two different outcomes based upon the OS running in the Simulator: iPhone 16 Pro simulator running iOS 18.4 - both breakpoints are reached iPhone 16 Pro simulator running iOS 26 - only the breakpoint on UIApplication.shared.registerForRemoteNotifications is reached. Assuming this is a bug in iOS 26. Or, is there something additional we now need to do to get push notifications working?

AlarmKit custom sounds are universally broken in iOS 26.0 stable - instead of playing your custom sound, it plays a system error/timeout beep. I've spent days investigating why custom sounds result in what sounds like an error beep (like when you cancel an operation or hit a timeout) instead of the actual audio file. I can now prove this is an Apple bug, not implementation error. Evidence: Test 1: My Implementation Followed Apple's documentation exactly Tried both bundle and Library/Sounds (as documented) Result: System error beep (not my audio) Test 2: Professional Apps Tested ADHDAlarms (popular AlarmKit example by jacobsapps) https://github.com/jacobsapps/ADHDAlarms Their airhorn.mp3 custom sound: same error beep (not an airhorn) Their default sound: works perfectly Test 3: Device Testing Physical iPhone (iOS 26.0 - 23A341): broken iOS Simulator: broken Not device-specific Files are found correctly, but the actual audio file is never played. Instead, you hear what sounds like a system error/cancellation tone. What I've Eliminated Not a Library/Sounds vs Bundle issue (both broken) Not a file format issue (.mp3, .caf, .m4a all broken) Not an implementation issue (professional apps broken too) Not a device issue (simulator and device both broken) Not a file size issue (5KB to 2MB all broken) The Documentation Lie: Apple's docs for AlertConfiguration.AlertSound.named(_:) state: "Choose a file that's in your app's main bundle or the Library/Sounds folder" https://developer.apple.com/documentation/activitykit/alertconfiguration/alertsound/named(_:) Both locations are broken. Tested on: iOS 26.0 (23A341), Xcode 26.0.1, Swift 6.2 Impact: This affects any app trying to: Provide personalized wake-up sounds Use custom alarm tones Create meditation/sleep apps Differentiate from default iOS alarms Current Status: Multiple bug reports filed: FB19900024, FB18237648, FB19779004 Apple engineer claimed "fixed in latest beta" in August Still broken in iOS 26.0 stable (September) Workaround: None that I know of. You must use .default sound. For apps needing custom audio, play it with AVAudioPlayer after the alarm fires and user opens the app. Question: Has ANYONE gotten custom AlarmKit sounds working in iOS 26.0 stable? If so, plzzz help I'd be so grateful.

Hi, We have a use case where our app needs to send repeated push notifications (both normal and critical alerts) to inform the user about a critical device state and grab their attention. Since iOS doesn’t allow us to schedule local notifications beyond 30 seconds, I need to send multiple pushes from the server side. My questions are: Is there any documented limit on how many push notifications can be sent back-to-back before Apple starts throttling or restricting them? Are critical alerts treated differently from normal notifications in terms of delivery restrictions or frequency limits? Is there a recommended approach for handling scenarios where repeated urgent notifications are necessary to keep the user informed? I want to make sure I’m following Apple’s guidelines and not risking rejection during review.

Hi Apple team, We’re shipping a Live Caller ID Lookup extension on iOS 18 and have a question about the automatic refresh of configuration/PIR parameters. Questions 1. Is there any documented interval/TTL (min/max) for the system’s automatic refresh of /config and PIR parameters, or is it entirely opportunistic (battery/network/usage)? I can’t find a cadence in the IdentityLookup docs. 2. Does iOS honor server cache headers (e.g., Cache-Control/Expires) to influence when it re-fetches? 3. Which events also trigger a refresh (enable/disable in Settings, OS/app update, device reboot, token/epoch change)? 4. Are there rate limits or best-practice limits for calling refreshExtensionContext and refreshPIRParameters?

There's a list of bug reports: FB19778882 FB19813796 FB19852724 FB19767262 FB20378888 FB20379383 FB20394663 Me and many other users have issue with push notifications. To reproduce this you should do this steps: Lock iPhone and make it idle for 10+ minutes; Send any message from other device via third-party app that uses push notifications (WhatsApp, Telegram and etc.); After few attempts you can see, that messages don't deliver. They delivers immediately when I unlock iPhone or go to the app. This bug reproduces on iOS 18.7 and 27. As I think iPhone goes to deep sleep after 10+ minutes after it locked and don't get push notifications. I've tried everything: many of settings, DFU without backup, but nothing helps to resolve this issue. Pay attention, please, cause this bug is very annoying and present on iOS 18.7 (that is the last for many devices) and latest iOS 26. Thanks!

I created my app. One of its functionality is receive remote notification in the background (it receives it from Firebase Cloud Messaging via APNS) and replies with device location data. This is "boat tracking and alarm" type of app. It worked well both on my iPhone (where I use the same Apple ID as on developer's account) and on my son's iPad (different Apple ID). After the first review, when app was rejected with some remarks, background remote notifications completely stopped working on my iPhone. It looks like my iPhone put the app in permanent sleep. It never receives the background notifications. It receives them though in 2 case: when I open the app (it is no longer in background) when location is changed (it wakes app in the background). But the app should also respond when the device is stable at the position (I use both: precise and Significant Location Change. In the latter case changes are very rare). Btw, I scheduled a background task, not location, and it also never gets executed, so this workaround does not work. I describe it, so any Apple engineer does not get confused, verifying that these remote notifications reach the device. NO, they never get through when app is in the background (THIS IS THE PROBLEM), not that they are never delivered (the are, in the foreground). And the proof that it is not a problem with the app or remote notification construction is: they work on another drives (iPad) with no issues. Sometimes they are very delayed, sometimes almost instant. But usually they work. they worked the same way on my iPhone (with my developer's Apple ID) before the first rejection, and I haven't messed with messaging functionality since then. Now I am over with the last hope I had. I finally got my app release in App Store. I hoped official version would release some blockade my iOS put on my app. But unfortunately not. Official version works the same way as the test one. It works fine (receiving notifications in the background) on my son's iPad and it does not receive any background notification on my iPhone (100% block rate). Can anyone help me how can I reset my apps limits, the iOS created for my app? It seems that the rejection was a sparkle here - this is just a hint. I can provide any system logs for Apple engineers from both devices (iPhone and iPad) if you would like to check this case.

ISSUE: CloudKit subscriptions are not triggering push notifications despite correct configuration. CloudKit logs show RecordSave events but NO NotificationSend events, indicating CloudKit is not attempting to send to APNS. CONTAINER: iCloud.Wunderkind.StrikeForceApp ENVIRONMENT: Tested in both Development and Production iOS 18.6.x Xcode 15.x (update with your version) Device: iPhone (not simulator) EVIDENCE: Subscriptions exist and are visible in CloudKit Dashboard Records are being created successfully (verified in logs) Device token is registered: 60eb962ff189dc5c2c0ef3e9d6643d72b4442a831bae224d2a553588b2e29139 Local notifications work correctly CloudKit logs show RecordSave but NO NotificationSend events STEPS TAKEN: Regenerated push certificates Disabled and re-enabled Push Notifications capability Deleted and recreated subscriptions Tested in both Development and Production environments Verified aps-environment entitlement matches environment Confirmed notification permissions granted SPECIFIC TEST: Creating a Challenge record with recipientRef matching my user triggers: ✅ RecordSave event in CloudKit logs ❌ No NotificationSend event ❌ No push notification received EXPECTED: CloudKit should send NotificationSend events and deliver push notifications when subscriptions match. ACTUAL: No NotificationSend events appear in CloudKit logs, no notifications delivered.

Notification coordination between iOS and watchOS is not working properly watchOS and iOS try to coordinate between phone and watch notifications. The concept here is that if there is a main app and a companion app, they could both be sending a notification, then the notification would alert on both, which is a deviation from how notification mirroring is handled if there is an iOS app but no watch app. The watch waits for the iOS notification to fire so they can determine if this is the same notification that needs to be deduped, displayed on one device but not the other, or separate notifications to be displayed both. If there is no notification on the phone, the watch will timeout after 13 seconds and alert anyway. If you have an iOS companion app, the best solution to this is to send the same notification on both devices simultaneously, and ensuring the UNNotificationRequest.identifier matches on both notifications. This will let the systems determine how to handle the notification correctly and quickly, and the notification will alert right away. https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/765669 According to the above article, "when a notification arrives on watchOS alone first, it coordinates with iOS," but in reality, it doesn't work properly. Detailed process of this phenomenon watchOS receives a notification. On watchOS, the notification is not immediately shown to the user. iOS receives a notification with the same UNNotificationRequest.identifier as in (1). The notification in (3) does not appear on either iOS or watchOS. However, the notification from (3) does appear in iOS Notification Center. Thirteen seconds after watchOS received the notification, the notification from (1) is shown to the user on watchOS. In the end, the iOS and watchOS notifications are not consolidated and each remains in its respective notification center. Up to (3) there are no issues. Starting with (4), both iOS and watchOS exhibit a lot of odd behavior. This phenomenon occurs with both local notifications and push notifications. When iOS receives the notification first, there is no problem. The notification for watch received later is processed appropriately, and the watchOS notification is not additionally displayed to the user. Expected proper process Same as above. Same as above. Same as above. The notification in (1) is integrated into the notification in (3). The notification in (3) is alerted to the user immediately. 2 sample projects to reproduce Only the main code is attached. Sample project1: local notifications Swift code for local notification app (iOS, watchOS) - App.swift.txt Sample project2: push notifications This sample project is implemented using Firebase Functions and Firebase Cloud Messaging. Swift code push notification app (iOS, watchOS) - App.swift.txt Server side JavaScript code for FirebaseFunction - index.js.txt Tested devices and OS This phenomenon occurred in both of the following patterns. Pattern 1 Xcode 26.0 iPhone 16 (iOS 26.0) Apple Watch series 10 (watchOS 26.0) Pattern 2 Xcode 16.4 iPhone 11 (iOS 18.6) Apple Watch SE 2nd gen (watchOS 11.6) Question Is this phenomenon a bug? Or is my understanding or implementation incorrect? Feedback Assistant number FB20339772

After porting code to Swift 6 (Xcode 16.4), I get a consistent crash (on simulator) when using UNUserNotificationServiceConnection It seems (searching on the web) that others have met the same issue. Is it a known Swift6 bug ? Or am I misusing UNUserNotification ? I do not have the crash when compiling on Xcode 26 ß5, which hints at an issue in Xcode 16.4. Crash log: Thread 10 Queue : com.apple.usernotifications.UNUserNotificationServiceConnection.call-out (serial) As far as I can tell, it seems error is when calling nonisolated func userNotificationCenter(_ center: UNUserNotificationCenter, willPresent notification: UNNotification, withCompletionHandler completionHandler: @escaping (UNNotificationPresentationOptions) -> Void) I had to declare non isolated to solve a compiler error. Main actor-isolated instance method 'userNotificationCenter(_:didReceive:withCompletionHandler:)' cannot be used to satisfy nonisolated requirement from protocol 'UNUserNotificationCenterDelegate' I was advised to: Add 'nonisolated' to 'userNotificationCenter(_:didReceive:withCompletionHandler:)' to make this instance method not isolated to the actor I filed a bug report: Aug 10, 2025 at 2:43 PM – FB19519575

We have a question regarding iOS app configuration and the Remote notifications background mode. During our testing, we observed: ＊When enabling or disabling Signing & Capabilities > Background Modes > Remote notifications, the change does not take effect on devices that already have the app installed. ＊The app continues to behave according to the old configuration. ＊Only after uninstalling the app and reinstalling it from the App Store do the new settings take effect (for example, whether the app can be woken up by silent push). ＊We also tested updating the app with a new version number (App Store upgrade flow), but the new settings still did not apply. Our questions are: 1.Is there any way to make iOS re-read the updated Signing & Capabilities (Background Modes) settings without requiring a full uninstall/reinstall? 2.Is it expected behavior that even an App Store upgrade with a new version number will not apply these changes? thanks!

When I turn the Ringtone and Alerts volume all the way up, I expect standard notifications to play at the loudest level the device allows. In theory, this should match the volume of a critical alert with its sound.volume set to 1.0 in payload. However, I’ve noticed that non-critical notifications still play quieter than critical alerts under these conditions. Critical alerts with volume: 1.0 sound noticeably louder than standard notifications, even though the Ringtone and Alerts slider is already set to maximum. And I couldn't find a documentation for this behavior anywhere. Is this expected behavior on iOS? And is there any way to make non-critical notifications play at the same maximum loudness as critical alerts? Thanks in advance for any clarification.

My app(The Smart Life app) is unable to receive push notifications. Please confirm whether APNs has received push notifications from Alibaba Cloud and whether APNs has successfully pushed notifications to the Smart Life app.The Smart Life app uses Alibaba Cloud's push notification service. The message ID pushed by Alibaba Cloud is: f7a02288-a995-47ed-b417-837461028f03 Current Symptom: Alibaba Cloud has reported that this message has been successfully pushed to APNs, but the smart life app has not received any push notifications. The feedback log from Alibaba Cloud shows that the APNs push was successful, but the smart life app did not receive any push. Because APNs do not have message receipts and Alibaba Cloud cannot obtain notification delivery status, it is recommended that I use the APNs channel message ID to submit a work order to Apple technical support for investigation. Note: All push notification permissions for the Smart Life app are enabled, and the Smart Life app is in the foreground when push notifications are sent.