Our app was rejected (4th time) under 1.1.12 “Build web-based apps” with the note “Your app must not require a desktop app to function”, and submissions are suspended for 30 days. I want to understand the rule properly before we spend the next slot, rather than guess and get it wrong twice.
What the app does: it prints documents (inventory transfer labels, packing slips) to a physical label printer when Shopify events fire. A browser cannot silently send a job to a specific local printer, so fully unattended printing needs a small companion app on the merchant’s computer. That is the part that tripped the rule, and I accept the reviewer’s reading of what we submitted.
The redesign we have now built: the embedded app renders the document and the merchant clicks Print, which opens it in the browser and prints through the normal browser print dialog. No download, nothing installed, works on any machine. The companion app becomes optional and only adds the hands-free part, so a merchant who never installs it can still do the complete job in the browser.
Two questions:
- Does that satisfy 1.1.12? The core workflow is fully web-based, but one convenience feature (unattended printing) still involves software on the merchant’s machine. Is the rule “the app must be usable without a desktop component”, or is it stricter, meaning no part of the offering may involve one at all?
- If a hybrid like this is acceptable, how should the companion app be presented so it reads as genuinely optional? Specifically, should it appear in the listing description and the demo video at all, or does mentioning it at all risk the same rejection? I would rather over-disclose than have it look like something we hid.
Happy to share the app handle privately if a staff member wants to look at the specific submission. Mostly I am after the general design rule so other developers building hardware-adjacent apps have something to point at.
Hey @kelonye! I’m checking with the App Store Review team on how 1.1.12 applies to a fully browser-based core workflow with an optional desktop companion, and how the companion should be disclosed in the listing and demo if that design is acceptable.
I’ll follow up here once I have a clear answer from them!
Hey @kelonye, I heard back from the App Store Review team with a clear answer on this.
An optional companion desktop app is fine in principle, as long as your app doesn’t rely on it to function. Requirement 1.1.12 says your app must not require a desktop app to function, and the key word is “require.” If a merchant can complete the full workflow in the browser without ever installing the companion app, that design satisfies the rule.
Reviewers do not install companion desktop apps on their hardware to test app functionality. Your review instructions and demo video should walk through the browser-only print flow end to end, not the desktop path. If the reviewer needs the companion app to test the app’s core function, it’ll read as a requirement and break that the same rule again.
For the listing, describe the desktop app accurately as an optional convenience for unattended printing, and make the browser path the primary experience. The disclosure should match how the app actually behaves.
They made it clear that this is guidance on the design rule, not a green light on your next submission. The review team will still assess the actual build and submission materials when you resubmit. Hope this helps clarify things for you!
Thanks @Donal-Shopify, and thanks for asking the review team, that’s the answer I needed.
To make sure I’ve got it right:
- Everything works in the browser. The document shows up in the embedded app, the merchant clicks Print, and it prints from the browser print dialog. A merchant who never installs the companion app can still do everything.
- The reviewer never needs the companion app. I didn’t know reviewers can’t install one, and that’s the part I’d have got wrong. Our demo video and testing notes will show the browser-only flow from start to finish, and the companion app won’t be a step in anything the reviewer does.
- The listing will say what it is: an optional add-on for unattended printing, with the browser path as the main way to use it. I’d rather say too much about it than have it look hidden.
I understand this is help with the rule, not a promise that our next submission passes. That’s fair. We’ll make sure the build and the materials match the description before we resubmit.
Leaving this here for the next person building something hardware-adjacent, since the rule sounds stricter than it is. “Require” is the key word.