What’s new in iOS 10.3 for Product Designers & Developers

Niels Boey
Prototypr
Published in
5 min readMar 30, 2017

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Apple released iOS 10.3 to all (compatible) iOS devices this week. The most notable changes are not visible yet, because they rely on designers and developers to take advantage of the newest features. These include in-app ratings, responding to reviews and changing app icons. Let’s take a look at how this all works.

In-app ratings

Apple made it now possible to ask your users to rate your app without leaving the app, the downside of this: users not returning to your app.

You should still choose wisely when to request a rating from your users. For example after a successful transaction or after watching a few episodes of their favorite TV show. Make sure your user actually uses your app before asking for a rating. Because chances are they won’t rate your app otherwise or worse: a negative review.

Filtering reviews is also advised, when you inspect a user had a bad experience with your app, guide them to email or an other form of direct communication that is not the App Store. When you know the user has a good experience, ask them for a rating, but give them the option to skip. The new native rating alert is stars only, so it will be less of an effort to leave a rating (without adding a comment).

Also these native rating alerts are extremely easy to implement, it literally takes only 1 line of code:

SKStoreReviewController.requestReview()

You will also need to import StoreKit, but still, only 2 lines of code. iOS will handle the rest, so you won’t have to.

Native iOS 10.3 rating alert

Won’t these alerts be annoying?

There will be a limit of 3 requests a year, so you will only be able to show the alert a few times. Use them sparingly and on a well thought out moment. Users will be able to turn off review requests for all apps in the Settings app. So make sure you have a fallback or find out if the user has turned this feature off, so you won’t show them a non-functional rating card.

TL;DR

  • Don’t interrupt the user, only ask for a review/rating when the user has finished a task or will not be bothered by the app’s request to be rated.
  • Implementing a native alert to rate your app is extremely easy
  • You can only ask for a review 3 times a year. So be careful when you show that important dialog.

Responding to App Reviews

Newly added to iTunes Connect is the possibility to respond to App Store reviews. Before iOS 10.3 there was no way to respond to reviews, which was already possible on Google’s Play Store. Commenting on user’s feedback can be a great way to help them out when having a negative experience with your app.

Once a reply has been added to a review, the user, who wrote that review, will be notified and will have the possibility to change their review. So you might be able to help them out and change their review which can result in a higher average user rating.

Responses can be edited or deleted at any time, so if incorrect information has been shared, you can change or remove the reply.

Important: Don’t use review responses to promote the app or any other content. You can ask users to change their review, but don’t misuse this.

iTunes Connect — Replying to a comment

TL;DR

  • Reply to reviews to help your users out when they have trouble using your app
  • Users can change their review/rating after you have replied to it
  • Replies can be edited and deleted at any time
  • Only use replies to help out users, don’t use it to promote other apps or content

Change your app icon — No update required

Changing an app icon always required an app update, which could take up to a few weeks, but is currently reduced to a few days. Updating an app icon is now possible without a required app update. It’s great to personalise your app or temporarily change the icon for a holiday or use the logo of the user’s favourite sports team.

Keep in mind that you need to add the icons to your app bundle when submitting the app for review. It’s currently not possible to add new icons remotely.

To add icons to your app bundle you need to add the @2x (120px x 120px) and @3x (180px x 180px) icons. Add them to your info.plist (more info can be found here) and set the new icon with this function:

UIApplication.shared.setAlternateIconName("NewIconName")

You can always set your app icon back to the default icon by using this function:

UIApplication.shared.setAlternateIconName(nil)

Any time you can change the icon, the user will get a confirmation when the icon has changed, so they know the app will have a different look on their homescreen.

You have changed the icon.

TL;DR

  • You can change your app icon at any time without requiring to update your app
  • App icons do need to be added to the app bundle when submitting the app to the App Store
  • Users will receive a native update when the icon has been changed, so they know what icon to look for on their homescreen

Don’t rate your app, rate your app’s reviews

Rule number one of creating an app is: Don’t rate your own apps.

Not only will you create a false user rating, because who’s going to give their own app a bad rating? It will also be unhelpful for new users, because they will get the wrong expectations of your app.

When receiving negative feedback: analyse what’s going wrong and fix it. Your app will eventually become better and this will get you better ratings. Writing positive reviews about your app will not actually make it better.

What you can do on a 3D touch enabled device, iPhone 6s (Plus) and iPhone 7 (Plus), is 3D touching on a review and mark it as Helpful or Not Helpful. You will also get the option to report a concern about a review. Examples: if it’s spam, not on topic, contains offensive material or something else (you will be able to add a comment).

Thanks for your feedback.

TL;DR

  • Just don’t rate your own apps
  • You can move up great reviews by rating them as helpful
  • Writing positive reviews yourself will not make your app any better

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