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by j45 415 days ago
Is it still the case that offering Apple ID is mandatory on the iOS store?

Forcing users to use certain identity providers while uninformed as a sole point of failure is a challenge.

Apple (or other providers) already have the user with an ID, having the app do the bidding of propagating it's use further is a different issue.

If it was optional, and a convenience/preference that could be added, that would be a different thing.

2 comments

It's mandatory if you allow or use other 3rd party auth (ie. Facebook or Google).
Appreciate this - I can't say it makes sense because some third auth might be specifically selected for user-type or industry alignment (LinkedIn, Github, Microsoft login, etc).

M365 login specifically can hook into quite a bit of organization information along with the user itself that can help configure apps, wouldn't be relevant for Apple in those kinds of B2B scenarios.

Apple ID is almost always a personal or individual one.

It can be convenient for sure, makes me think about how there's other things where Apple is/was the only choice for the most part like payments, although that's changed for the time being.

It was our mistake to allow Apple Sign In. We wanted to make things better for users, but didn’t expect Apple to suddenly break their own login emails without warning.
Apple logins are useful for sure, I still use it sparingly, not ideal to have so many identity providers and they're all trying to vy for it.

Most people are where they started, whether its Microsoft, Gmail, Apple, etc.