Will adding in-app purchases to an app affect users who already bought it?

Question

I have an app that I am about to add in-app purchases.

My question is this. The app uses a certificate for development and distribution that is used by several other apps of mine, apps that don't have in-app purchase.

As I am adding in-app purchase now, I will have to change this app's APP ID so I can create a provisioning profile for in-app purchases. Will this change affect the app in any way? I mean, Will I be able to upload the new binary with a different provisional profile generated with another AppID? Will old users be able to upgrade?

Answer 1

Your app must have the same bundle ID. It's the string in your Info.plist file. If that's left unchanged, users will have no problem upgrading.

If I understood your question correctly, you had a wildcard distribution provisioning profile when you first submitted this app? As long as the new provisioning profile still matches the bundle ID in Info.plist, it's ok.

Answer 2

You may have created an App ID before we had in-app purchase or push-notification service. Maybe you didn't think you needed those and wanted to create a suite of similar apps. Now you want those features.

Say you had an App ID of:

com.mycompany.appsuite.*

And your app's bundle ID (in the plist and elsewhere) is:

com.mycompany.appsuite.mycoolapp

In order to be able to do change the App ID for in-app purchase or push-notification, then you should go to the developer.apple.com Provisioning Portal add a new App ID of:

com.mycompany.appsuite.mycoolapp

This App ID matches your Bundle ID, so your users will not have to repurchase your app, and it will also qualify your app for in-app or push-notification.