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iPhone app release dates have always been a cross-your-fingers issue for iPhone app developers.  In 2009, if devs wanted the visibility of a category’s New Release list, they had to go into iTunes Connect and change their release date to the current day as soon as their app was approved.  If a dev waited too long (more than a 24 hours), the opportunity was lost and the app would not appear on the new release list.  A few months ago, Apple fixed this peculiarity.  However there was still no way to do planned release date and also appear on the new release list.  The day Apple approved your app was your release date (as it pertained to the New Release list) whether you liked it or not.

I’ve noticed some changes in The App Store recently which have led me to conclude that Release Date behavior has changed once again.  Last Friday my new app, Ringtone Piano Free, was waiting for review.  Keeping up to date with the latest review times on the iPhoneDevSDK.com Forum I expected my app to be reviewed and released on Saturday.  Saturday came and went; along with Sunday.  During this time I noticed some apps posting in the New Releases of each category, but it wasn’t the plethora of new apps that are usually released.  On Sunday, in the Music New Releases, there were four apps instead of the 16-30 normally released.  This led me to believe that either (a) Apple was working through the weekend with limited review capacity or (b) Apple was not reviewing any apps over the weekend and developers could now actually control their release date.  I concluded the latter based on two more App Store peculiarities I’d observed:  (1) the ‘Post Date’ listed on the Mobile version of the App Store is not the same as the ‘Released Date’ listed on the Desktop version of The App Store and (2) some apps showing up in the New Release list already had hundreds of reviews by their new ‘release date’ and appearance on the New Release list.

So on Monday (Feb 15th) when my app’s status changed to ‘In Review’ I decided to do some experimenting.  I went into iTunes Connect and changed my release date to Feb 16th.  Then, when Ringtone Piano Free was approved on that same day (Feb 15th), I changed the release date to Feb 15th.  Here’s what I saw in The App Store:

Even though I changed my release date to Feb 15th after my app was approved, the ‘Released Date’ in the desktop version of The App Store was the Feb 16th date that was set when the app was approved.  Here’s what I saw on the mobile version of The App Store:

It appears the mobile version of The App Store reflects the date the app is available in The App Store.

So when did my app show up in the New Releases section?  Wednesday, Feb 17th sometime in the early AM with the rest of the Feb 16th new releases.  So here’s my conclusion on the way release dates now work:

1. Your release date is set once your app is approved.  If your iTunes Connect release date is set to the past, the release date is set to the date of app approval.  If your iTunes Connect release date is set to the future, that future date becomes your release date.
2. If your release date is set to the future when your app is approved, you can make your app available in The App Store at any time, but your release date as it pertains to new release lists will still reflect a future date.

So the old practice of setting the release date months or years in the future and then changing the release date when the app is approved is no longer the best practice if you want the visibility of the new release list.  Furthermore, it’s now easier to do a ‘soft’ release, get a few reviews, and then get your app on the New Release list by setting your release date to a few days in the future.