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Apple Music web player will not work on wkwebview web browser or electron chromium browser.
Hello, I'm trying to create a webbrowser but currently when signed into apple music webplayer I get the following message when I attempt to play on any versions of my webbrowser: Not available on the web You can listen to this in the Apple Music app. Is there a way to setup DRM (assuming this is the issue) with apple to allow my webbrowser to play this content? I believe Apple TV is also affected. Thank you ahead of time.
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May ’25
Can I Fade Out Track Volume Before End Using ApplicationMusicPlayer?
I’m building a music app using Apple Music streaming via ApplicationMusicPlayer. My goal is to decrease the volume of the current song during the last 10 seconds, and when the next track begins, restore the volume to its normal level. I know that ApplicationMusicPlayer doesn’t expose a volume API, and I want to avoid triggering the system volume HUD. ✅ Using Apple Music streaming (not local files) ❓ Is it possible to implement per-track fade-out/fade-in logic with ApplicationMusicPlayer? Appreciate any clarification or official guidance!
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Jun ’25
[iOS 26 bug] AVInputPickerInteraction selection immediately reverts on iOS 26
Hello everyone, I'm implementing the new AVInputPickerInteraction API on iOS 26 to allow users to select their microphone from a custom settings menu before recording. The implementation seems correct, but I'm encountering a strange issue where the input selection immediately reverts to the previous device. The Situation: The picker is presented correctly via a manual call to .present(). I can see all available inputs (e.g., "iPhone Microphone" and "AirPods"). The current input is "iPhone Microphone". I tap on "AirPods". The UI updates to show "AirPods" as selected for a fraction of a second, then immediately jumps back to "iPhone Microphone". The same thing happens in reverse. It seems like the system is automatically reverting the audio route change requested by the picker. My Implementation: My setup follows the standard pattern discussed in the WWDC sessions. Setup Code: This setup is performed once before the user can trigger the picker. @available(iOS 26.0, *) var inputPickerInteraction: AVInputPickerInteraction? // Note: The AVAudioSession is configured to .playAndRecord // and set to active elsewhere in the code before this setup is called. if #available(iOS 26.0, *) { // Setup the picker let picker = AVInputPickerInteraction() self.inputPickerInteraction = picker self.view.addInteraction(picker) // Added to establish context } Presentation Code: When a user selects "Change Input" from my custom settings menu, I call .present() on the main thread. // In a delegate method from a custom menu if #available(iOS 26.0, *) { DispatchQueue.main.async { self.inputPickerInteraction?.present(animated: true) } } What I've already checked: The AVAudioSession is active and its category is .playAndRecord. The inputPickerInteraction object is not nil. The .present() method is being called on the main thread. The picker is added to a view using view.addInteraction() in the setup phase. I've reviewed my code to ensure there is no other logic that could be manually resetting the AVAudioSession's preferred input. Has anyone else experienced this behavior? I suspect this might be a bug in the new API, but I want to make sure I'm not missing a crucial step in managing the AVAudioSession state. Any insights or potential workarounds would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
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Sep ’25
On iOS26, in our video playback app(use AVPlayer), the sound and video are out of sync when playing after seeking.
Our app plays TS files on an iPhone. The app fragments the TS files, creates an M3U8 playlist, converts them to HLS(HTTP Live Streaming), and then uses AVPlayer to play the video content. On a device running iOS 26, after starting playback and seeking, restarting playback causes the video and audio to be out of sync (by about 2-3 seconds depending on the situation). This also occurs on iPadOS/macOS 26. This issue was not observed prior to iOS 18. We are trying to fix this issue on the app side, but we have the following questions: The behavior of AVPlayer is different between iOS 26 and previous versions. Has there been any change that could be considered? Or is it a bug? We tried pausing before seeking, but it didn’t seem to have any effect. Are there any APIs or workarounds that can improve this? We would appreciate it if you could tell us any other helpful documents or URLs.
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Sep ’25
How to Keep Camera Running in iOS PiP Mode (Like WhatsApp/Google Meet)?
I'm using Picture-in-Picture (PiP) mode in my native iOS application, which is similar to Google Meet, using the VideoSDK.live Native iOS SDK. The SDK has built-in support for PiP and it's working fine for the most part. However, I'm running into a problem: When the app enters PiP mode, the local camera (self-video) of the participant freezes or stops. I want to fix this and achieve the same smooth behavior seen in apps like Google Meet and WhatsApp, where the local camera keeps working even in PiP mode. I've been trying to find documentation or examples on how to achieve this but haven't had much luck. I came across a few mentions that using the camera in the background may require special entitlements from Apple (like in the entitlements file). Most of the official documentation says background camera access is restricted due to Apple’s privacy policies. So my questions are: Has anyone here successfully implemented background camera access in PiP mode on iOS? If yes, what permissions or entitlements are required? How do apps like WhatsApp and Google Meet achieve this functionality on iPhones? Any help, advice, or pointers would be really appreciated!
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Aug ’25
Is a Locked Capture Extension allowed to just "open the app" when the device is unlocked?
Hey, Quick question. I noticed that Adobe's new app, Project Indigo, allows you to open the app using the Camera Control button. However, when your device is locked it just shows this screen: Would this normally be approved by the Appstore approval process? I ask because I would like to do something similar with my camera app. I know that this is not the best user experience, but my apps UI is not built in Swift and I don't have the resources to build the UI again. At least this way the user experience would be improved from what it is now, where users cannot even launch the app. I get many requests per week about this feature and would love to improve the UX for my users, even if it's not the best possible. Thanks, Alex
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Jun ’25
Is Phase Detection Autofocus degrading video stabilization, and can I disable it?
I'm developing a video capture app using AVFoundation, designed specifically for use on a boat pylon to record slalom water skiing. This setup involves considerable vibration. As you may know, the OIS that Apple began adding to lenses since the iPhone 7 is actually very problematic in high vibration circumstances, ironically creating very shaky video, whereas lenses without OIS produce perfectly stable video. Because of this, up until iPhone 14, the solution for my app was simply to use the Selfie lens, which did not have OIS. Starting with iPhone 14 through iPhone 16 (non-Pro models), technical specs suggest the selfie lens still does not include OIS. However, I’m still seeing the same kind of shaky video behavior I see on OIS-equipped lenses. The one hardware change I see in this camera module is the addition of PDAF (Phase Detection Autofocus), so that is my best guess as to what is causing the unstable video. 1- Does that make any sense - that in high vibration settings, PDAF could create unstable video in the same way that OIS does? Or could it be something else that was changed between the iPhone 13 and 14 Selfie lens? Thinking that the issue was PDAF, I figured that if I enabled my app to set a Manual Focus level, that ought to circumvent PDAF (expecting that if a lens is manually focusing, it can’t also be autofocusing via PDAF). However, even with manual focus locked via AVCaptureDevice in my app, on the Selfie lens of an iPhone 16, the video still comes out very shaky, basically unusable. I also tested with the built-in Apple Camera app (using the press-and-hold to lock focus and exposure) and another 3rd party camera app to lock focus, all with the same results, so it's not that my app just isn't correctly doing manual focus. So I'm stuck with these questions: 2- Does the selfie camera on iPhones 14–16 use PDAF even when focus is set to locked/manual mode? 3- Is there any way in AVFoundation to disable or suppress PDAF during video recording (e.g., a flag, device format setting, or private API)? 4- Is PDAF behavior or suppression documented or controllable via AVCaptureDevice or any related class? 5- If no control of PDAF is available, are there any best practices for stabilizing or smoothing this effect programmatically? Note that I also have set my app to use the most aggressive form of stabilization available, so it defaults to .cinematicExtendedEnhanced, if that’s not available, then .cinematicExtended, etc. On the 16 Selfie lens, it is using .cinematicExtended. As an additional question: 6- Would those be the most appropriate stabilization settings for a high vibration environment, and if not, what would be best?
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May ’25
ICDeviceBrowser authorization requests always return ICAuthorizationStatusNotDetermined on iOS 26.1 beta
Area ImageCaptureCore / ICDeviceBrowser Description On iOS 26.1 beta, calling requestControlAuthorization() requestContentsAuthorization() always returns .notDetermined and never transitions to .authorized or .denied. This prevents apps from properly accessing device control or contents authorization. The issue occurs regardless of device state or prior requests. Steps to Reproduce 1. Create and start an ICDeviceBrowser instance. 2. Call requestControlAuthorization() or requestContentsAuthorization(). 3. Inspect the returned ICAuthorizationStatus. Expected Result • The system should prompt the user if necessary. • A final status of either .authorized or .denied should be returned. Actual Result • The completion handler always reports .notDetermined. • No user prompt appears and the status does not change. Version / Build • iOS 26.1 beta • Xcode Hardware • [iPhone 15 Pro, iPad Pro (M2)] Impact This regression blocks development and testing of features relying on ImageCaptureCore. Applications depending on device browsing and content access cannot proceed, which significantly affects workflows involving external device integration. Notes This appears to be a regression compared to earlier iOS releases.
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Sep ’25
How do I find the catalogID for songs in a apple music playlist? (MusicKit & Apple Music API)
Hello, How do I find the apple music catalogID for songs in a apple music playlist? Im building an iOS app that uses MusicKit/Apple Music API. For this example, you can assume that my iOS app simply allows users to upload their apple music playlists. And when users open a specific playlist, I want to find the catalogID for each song. Currently all the songs are returning song IDs in this format “i.PkdJvPXI2AJgm8”. I believe these are libraryIDs, not catalogIDs. I’d like to find a front end solution using MusicKit. But perhaps a back end solution using the Apple Music Rest API is required. Any recommendations would be appreciated!
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Jun ’25
iOS 18 Picture-in-Picture dynamically changes UIScreen.main.bounds on iPhone 11 causing keyboard clipping and layout issues
When creating and activating AVPictureInPictureController on iPhone 11 running iOS 18.x, the main screen viewport unexpectedly changes from the native 375×812 logical points to 414×896 points (the size of a different device such as iPhone XR/11 Plus). Additionally, a separate UIWindow with zero CGRect is created. This causes UIKit layout calculations, especially related to the keyboard and safeAreaInsets, to malfunction and results in issues like keyboard clipping and general UI misalignment. The problem appears tied specifically to iOS 18+ behavior and does not manifest on earlier iOS versions or other devices consistently. Steps to Reproduce: Run the app on iPhone 11 with iOS 18.x (including the latest minor updates). Instantiate and start an AVPictureInPictureController during app runtime. Observe that UIScreen.main.bounds changes from 375×812 (native iPhone 11 size) to 414×896. Notice a secondary UIWindow appears with frame CGRectZero. Interact with text inputs that cause the keyboard to appear. The keyboard is clipped or partially obscured, causing UI usability issues. Layout elements dependent on UIScreen.main.bounds or safeAreaInsets behave incorrectly. Expected Behavior: UIScreen.main.bounds should not dynamically change upon PiP controller creation. The coordinate space and viewport should remain accurate to device native dimensions. The keyboard and UI layout should adjust properly with respect to the actual on-screen size and safe areas. Actual Behavior: UIScreen.main.bounds changes to 414×896 upon PiP controller creation on iPhone 11 iOS 18+. A zero-rect secondary UIWindow is created, impacting layout queries. Keyboard clipping and UI layout bugs occur. The app viewport and coordinate space are inconsistent with device hardware.
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Jul ’25
Personas and Lighting in a visionOS 26 (or earlier) SharePlay Session
Use case: When SharePlay -ing a fully immersive 3D scene (e.g. a virtual stage), I would like to shine lights on specific Personas, so they show up brighter when someone in the scene is recording the feed (think a camera person in the scene wearing Vision Pro). Note: This spotlight effect only needs to render in the camera person's headset and does NOT need to be journaled or shared. Before I dive into this, my technical question: Can environmental and/or scene lighting affect Persona brightness in a SharePlay? If not, is there a way to programmatically make Personas "brighter" when recording? My screen recordings always seem to turn out darker than what's rendered in environment, and manually adjusting the contrast tends to blow out the details in a Persona's face (especially in visionOS 26).
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Jun ’25
Failed to change the TTS language to CN or TW
I have some question about the TTS My device default language is zh-HK. (cantonese) my device is iPhone 16 Pro, IOS 18.6 I create a function speakMandarin I want the device to speak the zh-CN (putonghua) however the device only can speak zh-HK (cantonese). I already set the AVSpeechSynthesisVoice language as zh-CN func speakMandarin(text: String) { print("speakMandarin, \(text)") lastError = nil // Reset error // Stop any ongoing speech before starting new if synthesizer.isSpeaking { synthesizer.stopSpeaking(at: .immediate) } // Configure speech utterance let utterance = AVSpeechUtterance(ssmlRepresentation: text)! utterance.rate = 0.5 // Natural speaking speed utterance.pitchMultiplier = 1.0 utterance.volume = 1.0 utterance.voice = AVSpeechSynthesisVoice(language: "zh-CN") let preferredLanguages = [ "zh-CN" , "zh-TW"] var selectedVoice: AVSpeechSynthesisVoice? for lang in preferredLanguages { if let voice = AVSpeechSynthesisVoice(language: lang) { print(lang) selectedVoice = voice utterance.voice = voice break } } // If no Mandarin voice found, use system default if selectedVoice == nil { selectedVoice = AVSpeechSynthesisVoice(language: nil) lastError = "未偵測到普通話語音包,將使用系統預設語音" print (lastError) } utterance.voice = selectedVoice print(utterance) synthesizer.speak(utterance) } here is my log speakMandarin, <speak>你好!我們來聊聊喜歡的動物吧。你喜歡什麼動物呢?</speak> zh-CN [AVSpeechUtterance 0x1194efb80] String: 你好!我們來聊聊喜歡的動物吧。你喜歡什麼動物呢? Voice: [AVSpeechSynthesisVoice 0x104ceff90] Language: zh-CN, Name: Tingting, Quality: Default [com.apple.voice.compact.zh-CN.Tingting] Rate: 0.50 Volume: 1.00 Pitch Multiplier: 1.00 Delays: Pre: 0.00(s) Post: 0.00(s)
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Sep ’25
WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab summary (Part 1 of 3)
(Note: this is part 1 of a 3 part posting. See Part 2 or Part 3) At WWDC25 we launched a new type of Lab event for the developer community - Group Labs. A Group Lab is a panel Q&A designed for a large audience of developers. Group Labs are a unique opportunity for the community to submit questions directly to a panel of Apple engineers and designers. Here are the highlights from the WWDC25 Group Lab for Camera & Photos. WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab ran for one hour at 6 PM PST on Tuesday June 10th, 2025 Introductory kick-off questions Question 1 Tell us a little about the new AVFoundation Capture APIs we've made available in the new iOS 26 developer preview? Cinematic Capture API (strong/weak focus, tracking focus)(scene monitoring)(simulated aperture)(dog/cat heads/groupIDs) Camera Controls and AirPod Stem Clicks Spatial Audio and Studio Quality AirPod Mics in Camera Lens Smudge Detection Exposure and Focus Rect of Interest Question 2 I built QR code scanning into my app, but on newer iPhones I have to hold the phone very far away from the QR code, otherwise the image is blurry and it doesn't scan. Why is this happening and how can I fix it? Every year, the cameras get better and better as we push the state of the art on iPhone photography and videography. This sometimes results in changes to the characteristics of the lenses. min focus distance newer phones have multiple lenses automatic switching behavior Use virtual device like the builtInDualWide or built in Triple, rather than just the builtInWide Set the videoZoomFactor to 2. You're done. Question 3 Last year, we saw some exciting new APIs introduced in AVFoundation in the health space. With Constant Color photography, developers can take pictures that have constant color regardless of ambient lighting. There are some further advancements this year. Davide, could you tell us about them? constant color photography is mean to remove the "tone mapping" applied to photograph captured with camera app, usually incldsuing artistic intent, and instead try to be a close as possible to the real color of the scene, regardless of the illumination constant color images could be captured in HEIF anf JPEG laste year. this year we are adding Support for the DICOM medical imaging photo format. It is a fomrat used by the health industry to store images related to medical subjects like MRI, skin problems, xray and so on. It's writable and also readable format on all OS26, supported through AVCapturePhotoOutput APIs and through the coregraphics api. for coregrapphics there is a new DICOM entry in the property dictionary which includes all the dicom availbale and defined propertie in a file. finder will also display all those in the info panel (Address why a developer would want to use it) - not for regualr picture taking apps. for those HEIF and JPEG are the preferred delivery format. use dicom if your app produces output that are health related, that you can also share with health providers or your doctors Main session developer questions Question 1 LiDAR vs. Dual Camera depth generation: Which resolution does the LiDAR sensor natively have (iPhone 16 Pro) and when to prefer LiDAR over Dual Camera? Both report formats with output resolutions (we don't advertise sensor resolution) Lidar vs Dual, etc: Lidar: Best for absolute depth, real world scale and computer vision Dual, etc: relative, disparity-based, less power, photo effects Also see: 2022 WWDC session "Discovery advancements in iOS camera capture: Depth, focus and multitasking" Question 2 Can true depth and lidar camera run at 60fps? Lidar can do 30fps (edited) Front true depth can do 60fps. Question 3 What’s the first class way to use PhotoKit to reimplement a high performance photo grid? We’ve been using a LazyVGrid and the photos caching manager, but are never able to hit the holy trinity (60hz, efficient memory footprint, minimal flashes of placeholder/empty cells) use the PHCachingImageManager to get media content delivered before you need to display it specify the size you need for grid sized display set the options PHVideoRequestOptionsDeliveryModeFastFormat, PHImageRequestOptionsDeliveryModeFastFormat and PHImageRequestOptionsResizeModeFast Question 4 For rending live preview of video stream, Is there performance overhead from using async and Swift UI for image updates vs UIViewRepresentable + AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer.self? AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer is the most efficient display path Use VDO + AVSampleBufferDisplayLayer if you need to modify the image data Swift UI image is optimized for static image content Question 5 Is there a way to configure the AVFoundation BuiltInLiDarDepthCamera mode to provide a depth map as accurate as ARKit at close range? The AVCaptureDepthDataOutput supports filtering that reduces noise and fills in invalid values. Consider using this for smoother depth maps Question 6 Pyramid-based photo editing in core image (such as adobe camera raw highlights and shadows)? First off you may want to look a the builtin filter called CIHighlightShadowAdjust Also the noise reduction in the CIRawFilter uses a pyramid-based algorithm. You can also write your own pyramid-based algorithms by taking an input image: down sample it by two multiply times using imageByApplyingAffineTransform apply additional CIKernels to each downsampled image as needed. use a custom CIKernel to combine the results. Question 7 Is the best way to integrate an in-app camera for a “non-camera” app UIImagePickerController? Yes, UIImagePickerController provides system-provided UI for capturing photos and movies. Question 8 Hello, my question is on Deferred Photo Processing? Say I have a photo capture app that adds a CIFilter to the capture. How can I take advantage of Deferred Photo Processing? Since I don’t know how to detect when the deferred captured photo is ready CIFilter can be called on the final at that point Photo will have to be re-inserted into the Photo library as adjustment Question 9 For shipping photo style assets in the app that need transparency what is the best format to use? JPEG2000? will moving to this save a lot of space comapred to PNG or other options? If you want lossless compression PNG is good and supports unpremutiplied alpha If you want lossy compression HEIF supports premutiplied or unpremutiplied alpha (Note: this is part 1 of a 3 part posting. See Part 2 or Part 3)
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Jul ’25
PHPickerViewController Not Offering public.hevc UTI for a Known HEVC Video
I'm working on an app where a user needs to select a video from their Photos library, and I need to get the original, unmodified HEVC (H.265) data stream to preserve its encoding. The Problem I have confirmed that my source videos are HEVC. I can record a new video with my iPhone 15 Pro Max camera set to "High Efficiency," export the "Unmodified Original" from Photos on my Mac, and verify that the codec is MPEG-H Part2/HEVC (H.265). However, when I select that exact same video in my app using PHPickerViewController, the itemProvider does not list public.hevc as an available type identifier. This forces me to fall back to a generic movie type, which results in the system providing me with a transcoded H.264 version of the video. Here is the debug output from my app after selecting a known HEVC video: ⚠️ 'public.hevc' not found. Falling back to generic movie type (likely H.264). What I've Tried My code explicitly checks for the public.hevc identifier in the registeredTypeIdentifiers array. Since it's not found, my HEVC-specific logic is never triggered. Here is a minimal version of my PHPickerViewControllerDelegate implementation: import UniformTypeIdentifiers // ... inside the Coordinator class ... func picker(_ picker: PHPickerViewController, didFinishPicking results: [PHPickerResult]) { picker.dismiss(animated: true) guard let result = results.first else { return } let itemProvider = result.itemProvider let hevcIdentifier = "public.hevc" let identifiers = itemProvider.registeredTypeIdentifiers print("Available formats from itemProvider: \(identifiers)") if identifiers.contains(hevcIdentifier) { print("✅ HEVC format found, requesting raw data...") itemProvider.loadDataRepresentation(forTypeIdentifier: hevcIdentifier) { (data, error) in // ... process H.265 data ... } } else { print("⚠️ 'public.hevc' not found. Falling back to generic movie type (likely H.264).") itemProvider.loadFileRepresentation(forTypeIdentifier: UTType.movie.identifier) { url, error in // ... process H.264 fallback ... } } } My Environment Device: iPhone 15 Pro Max iOS Version: iOS 18.5 Xcode Version: 16.2 My Questions Are there specific conditions (e.g., the video being HDR/Dolby Vision, Cinematic, or stored in iCloud) under which PHPickerViewController's itemProvider would intentionally not offer the public.hevc type identifier, even for an HEVC video? What is the definitive, recommended API sequence to guarantee that I receive the original, unmodified data stream for a video asset, ensuring that no transcoding to H.264 occurs during the process? Any insight into why public.hevc might be missing from the registeredTypeIdentifiers for a known HEVC asset would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
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Jul ’25
UIViewController + AVPlayerLayer + AVPlayer cannot AirPlay to HomePod on tvOS 18.5, but AVPlayerViewController + AVPlayer is ok
1, Devices Apple TV HD tvOS 18.5 (22L572) Mode(A1625) HomePod Gen1 OS18.5 (22L572) 2, Test cases: 2.1 UIViewController + AVPlayerLayer + AVPlayer Result: Can not AirPlay to HomePod Sample code for UIViewController + AVPlayer 2.1 AVPlayerViewController + AVPlayer Result: Can AirPlay to HomePod Sample code for AVPlayerViewController + AVPlayer
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Aug ’25
Currently Playing Track endpoint on MusicKit
add a currently playing track endpoint on the apple music api. its kinda wild how apple music goes after spotify without having such a useful endpoint.
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180
Activity
Sep ’25
Apple Music web player will not work on wkwebview web browser or electron chromium browser.
Hello, I'm trying to create a webbrowser but currently when signed into apple music webplayer I get the following message when I attempt to play on any versions of my webbrowser: Not available on the web You can listen to this in the Apple Music app. Is there a way to setup DRM (assuming this is the issue) with apple to allow my webbrowser to play this content? I believe Apple TV is also affected. Thank you ahead of time.
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172
Activity
May ’25
Background audio player issue
I am work an app development on an app which request an audio function in background as an alert sound. during debug testing , the function work fine, but once I testing standalone without debugging , The function not work , it will play out the sound when I back to app. does any way to trace the issues ?
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163
Activity
May ’25
Can I Fade Out Track Volume Before End Using ApplicationMusicPlayer?
I’m building a music app using Apple Music streaming via ApplicationMusicPlayer. My goal is to decrease the volume of the current song during the last 10 seconds, and when the next track begins, restore the volume to its normal level. I know that ApplicationMusicPlayer doesn’t expose a volume API, and I want to avoid triggering the system volume HUD. ✅ Using Apple Music streaming (not local files) ❓ Is it possible to implement per-track fade-out/fade-in logic with ApplicationMusicPlayer? Appreciate any clarification or official guidance!
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157
Activity
Jun ’25
[iOS 26 bug] AVInputPickerInteraction selection immediately reverts on iOS 26
Hello everyone, I'm implementing the new AVInputPickerInteraction API on iOS 26 to allow users to select their microphone from a custom settings menu before recording. The implementation seems correct, but I'm encountering a strange issue where the input selection immediately reverts to the previous device. The Situation: The picker is presented correctly via a manual call to .present(). I can see all available inputs (e.g., "iPhone Microphone" and "AirPods"). The current input is "iPhone Microphone". I tap on "AirPods". The UI updates to show "AirPods" as selected for a fraction of a second, then immediately jumps back to "iPhone Microphone". The same thing happens in reverse. It seems like the system is automatically reverting the audio route change requested by the picker. My Implementation: My setup follows the standard pattern discussed in the WWDC sessions. Setup Code: This setup is performed once before the user can trigger the picker. @available(iOS 26.0, *) var inputPickerInteraction: AVInputPickerInteraction? // Note: The AVAudioSession is configured to .playAndRecord // and set to active elsewhere in the code before this setup is called. if #available(iOS 26.0, *) { // Setup the picker let picker = AVInputPickerInteraction() self.inputPickerInteraction = picker self.view.addInteraction(picker) // Added to establish context } Presentation Code: When a user selects "Change Input" from my custom settings menu, I call .present() on the main thread. // In a delegate method from a custom menu if #available(iOS 26.0, *) { DispatchQueue.main.async { self.inputPickerInteraction?.present(animated: true) } } What I've already checked: The AVAudioSession is active and its category is .playAndRecord. The inputPickerInteraction object is not nil. The .present() method is being called on the main thread. The picker is added to a view using view.addInteraction() in the setup phase. I've reviewed my code to ensure there is no other logic that could be manually resetting the AVAudioSession's preferred input. Has anyone else experienced this behavior? I suspect this might be a bug in the new API, but I want to make sure I'm not missing a crucial step in managing the AVAudioSession state. Any insights or potential workarounds would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
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254
Activity
Sep ’25
AVPlayer keyframes request on mobile device but don't see on safari browser
We are seeing logs were on iOS devices we see some keyframes request. but on safari browser don’t see any request like this. could you please explain what is it. /d8ceb9244ff889b42b82eb807327531-c27dbcb10e0bbf3cde6c-1/d8ceb9244ff88e9b42b82eb807327531-c27dbcb10e0bbf3cde6c-1/keyframes/hls/.
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137
Activity
Jun ’25
On iOS26, in our video playback app(use AVPlayer), the sound and video are out of sync when playing after seeking.
Our app plays TS files on an iPhone. The app fragments the TS files, creates an M3U8 playlist, converts them to HLS(HTTP Live Streaming), and then uses AVPlayer to play the video content. On a device running iOS 26, after starting playback and seeking, restarting playback causes the video and audio to be out of sync (by about 2-3 seconds depending on the situation). This also occurs on iPadOS/macOS 26. This issue was not observed prior to iOS 18. We are trying to fix this issue on the app side, but we have the following questions: The behavior of AVPlayer is different between iOS 26 and previous versions. Has there been any change that could be considered? Or is it a bug? We tried pausing before seeking, but it didn’t seem to have any effect. Are there any APIs or workarounds that can improve this? We would appreciate it if you could tell us any other helpful documents or URLs.
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435
Activity
Sep ’25
Using non-local custom catalogues with Shazamkit
Hi, I'm trying to plan out development of an app and am wondering if it is possible to have user generated content automatically populate into a custom shazamkit catalogue and be able to query this catalogue non-locally? Storing all the submissions locally would obviously not scale.
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98
Activity
Jun ’25
How to Keep Camera Running in iOS PiP Mode (Like WhatsApp/Google Meet)?
I'm using Picture-in-Picture (PiP) mode in my native iOS application, which is similar to Google Meet, using the VideoSDK.live Native iOS SDK. The SDK has built-in support for PiP and it's working fine for the most part. However, I'm running into a problem: When the app enters PiP mode, the local camera (self-video) of the participant freezes or stops. I want to fix this and achieve the same smooth behavior seen in apps like Google Meet and WhatsApp, where the local camera keeps working even in PiP mode. I've been trying to find documentation or examples on how to achieve this but haven't had much luck. I came across a few mentions that using the camera in the background may require special entitlements from Apple (like in the entitlements file). Most of the official documentation says background camera access is restricted due to Apple’s privacy policies. So my questions are: Has anyone here successfully implemented background camera access in PiP mode on iOS? If yes, what permissions or entitlements are required? How do apps like WhatsApp and Google Meet achieve this functionality on iPhones? Any help, advice, or pointers would be really appreciated!
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278
Activity
Aug ’25
Is a Locked Capture Extension allowed to just "open the app" when the device is unlocked?
Hey, Quick question. I noticed that Adobe's new app, Project Indigo, allows you to open the app using the Camera Control button. However, when your device is locked it just shows this screen: Would this normally be approved by the Appstore approval process? I ask because I would like to do something similar with my camera app. I know that this is not the best user experience, but my apps UI is not built in Swift and I don't have the resources to build the UI again. At least this way the user experience would be improved from what it is now, where users cannot even launch the app. I get many requests per week about this feature and would love to improve the UX for my users, even if it's not the best possible. Thanks, Alex
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339
Activity
Jun ’25
Is Phase Detection Autofocus degrading video stabilization, and can I disable it?
I'm developing a video capture app using AVFoundation, designed specifically for use on a boat pylon to record slalom water skiing. This setup involves considerable vibration. As you may know, the OIS that Apple began adding to lenses since the iPhone 7 is actually very problematic in high vibration circumstances, ironically creating very shaky video, whereas lenses without OIS produce perfectly stable video. Because of this, up until iPhone 14, the solution for my app was simply to use the Selfie lens, which did not have OIS. Starting with iPhone 14 through iPhone 16 (non-Pro models), technical specs suggest the selfie lens still does not include OIS. However, I’m still seeing the same kind of shaky video behavior I see on OIS-equipped lenses. The one hardware change I see in this camera module is the addition of PDAF (Phase Detection Autofocus), so that is my best guess as to what is causing the unstable video. 1- Does that make any sense - that in high vibration settings, PDAF could create unstable video in the same way that OIS does? Or could it be something else that was changed between the iPhone 13 and 14 Selfie lens? Thinking that the issue was PDAF, I figured that if I enabled my app to set a Manual Focus level, that ought to circumvent PDAF (expecting that if a lens is manually focusing, it can’t also be autofocusing via PDAF). However, even with manual focus locked via AVCaptureDevice in my app, on the Selfie lens of an iPhone 16, the video still comes out very shaky, basically unusable. I also tested with the built-in Apple Camera app (using the press-and-hold to lock focus and exposure) and another 3rd party camera app to lock focus, all with the same results, so it's not that my app just isn't correctly doing manual focus. So I'm stuck with these questions: 2- Does the selfie camera on iPhones 14–16 use PDAF even when focus is set to locked/manual mode? 3- Is there any way in AVFoundation to disable or suppress PDAF during video recording (e.g., a flag, device format setting, or private API)? 4- Is PDAF behavior or suppression documented or controllable via AVCaptureDevice or any related class? 5- If no control of PDAF is available, are there any best practices for stabilizing or smoothing this effect programmatically? Note that I also have set my app to use the most aggressive form of stabilization available, so it defaults to .cinematicExtendedEnhanced, if that’s not available, then .cinematicExtended, etc. On the 16 Selfie lens, it is using .cinematicExtended. As an additional question: 6- Would those be the most appropriate stabilization settings for a high vibration environment, and if not, what would be best?
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241
Activity
May ’25
Is there any way to disable PHASE/CoreAudio logging?
Is there a way to permanently disable PHASE SDK logging? It seems to be a lot chattier than Apple's other SDKs. While developing a RealityKit app that uses AudioPlaybackController, I must manually hide the PHASE SDK log output several times each day so I can see my app's log messages. Thank you.
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373
Activity
Jun ’25
ICDeviceBrowser authorization requests always return ICAuthorizationStatusNotDetermined on iOS 26.1 beta
Area ImageCaptureCore / ICDeviceBrowser Description On iOS 26.1 beta, calling requestControlAuthorization() requestContentsAuthorization() always returns .notDetermined and never transitions to .authorized or .denied. This prevents apps from properly accessing device control or contents authorization. The issue occurs regardless of device state or prior requests. Steps to Reproduce 1. Create and start an ICDeviceBrowser instance. 2. Call requestControlAuthorization() or requestContentsAuthorization(). 3. Inspect the returned ICAuthorizationStatus. Expected Result • The system should prompt the user if necessary. • A final status of either .authorized or .denied should be returned. Actual Result • The completion handler always reports .notDetermined. • No user prompt appears and the status does not change. Version / Build • iOS 26.1 beta • Xcode Hardware • [iPhone 15 Pro, iPad Pro (M2)] Impact This regression blocks development and testing of features relying on ImageCaptureCore. Applications depending on device browsing and content access cannot proceed, which significantly affects workflows involving external device integration. Notes This appears to be a regression compared to earlier iOS releases.
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397
Activity
Sep ’25
How do I find the catalogID for songs in a apple music playlist? (MusicKit & Apple Music API)
Hello, How do I find the apple music catalogID for songs in a apple music playlist? Im building an iOS app that uses MusicKit/Apple Music API. For this example, you can assume that my iOS app simply allows users to upload their apple music playlists. And when users open a specific playlist, I want to find the catalogID for each song. Currently all the songs are returning song IDs in this format “i.PkdJvPXI2AJgm8”. I believe these are libraryIDs, not catalogIDs. I’d like to find a front end solution using MusicKit. But perhaps a back end solution using the Apple Music Rest API is required. Any recommendations would be appreciated!
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138
Activity
Jun ’25
iOS 18 Picture-in-Picture dynamically changes UIScreen.main.bounds on iPhone 11 causing keyboard clipping and layout issues
When creating and activating AVPictureInPictureController on iPhone 11 running iOS 18.x, the main screen viewport unexpectedly changes from the native 375×812 logical points to 414×896 points (the size of a different device such as iPhone XR/11 Plus). Additionally, a separate UIWindow with zero CGRect is created. This causes UIKit layout calculations, especially related to the keyboard and safeAreaInsets, to malfunction and results in issues like keyboard clipping and general UI misalignment. The problem appears tied specifically to iOS 18+ behavior and does not manifest on earlier iOS versions or other devices consistently. Steps to Reproduce: Run the app on iPhone 11 with iOS 18.x (including the latest minor updates). Instantiate and start an AVPictureInPictureController during app runtime. Observe that UIScreen.main.bounds changes from 375×812 (native iPhone 11 size) to 414×896. Notice a secondary UIWindow appears with frame CGRectZero. Interact with text inputs that cause the keyboard to appear. The keyboard is clipped or partially obscured, causing UI usability issues. Layout elements dependent on UIScreen.main.bounds or safeAreaInsets behave incorrectly. Expected Behavior: UIScreen.main.bounds should not dynamically change upon PiP controller creation. The coordinate space and viewport should remain accurate to device native dimensions. The keyboard and UI layout should adjust properly with respect to the actual on-screen size and safe areas. Actual Behavior: UIScreen.main.bounds changes to 414×896 upon PiP controller creation on iPhone 11 iOS 18+. A zero-rect secondary UIWindow is created, impacting layout queries. Keyboard clipping and UI layout bugs occur. The app viewport and coordinate space are inconsistent with device hardware.
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273
Activity
Jul ’25
Personas and Lighting in a visionOS 26 (or earlier) SharePlay Session
Use case: When SharePlay -ing a fully immersive 3D scene (e.g. a virtual stage), I would like to shine lights on specific Personas, so they show up brighter when someone in the scene is recording the feed (think a camera person in the scene wearing Vision Pro). Note: This spotlight effect only needs to render in the camera person's headset and does NOT need to be journaled or shared. Before I dive into this, my technical question: Can environmental and/or scene lighting affect Persona brightness in a SharePlay? If not, is there a way to programmatically make Personas "brighter" when recording? My screen recordings always seem to turn out darker than what's rendered in environment, and manually adjusting the contrast tends to blow out the details in a Persona's face (especially in visionOS 26).
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130
Activity
Jun ’25
Failed to change the TTS language to CN or TW
I have some question about the TTS My device default language is zh-HK. (cantonese) my device is iPhone 16 Pro, IOS 18.6 I create a function speakMandarin I want the device to speak the zh-CN (putonghua) however the device only can speak zh-HK (cantonese). I already set the AVSpeechSynthesisVoice language as zh-CN func speakMandarin(text: String) { print("speakMandarin, \(text)") lastError = nil // Reset error // Stop any ongoing speech before starting new if synthesizer.isSpeaking { synthesizer.stopSpeaking(at: .immediate) } // Configure speech utterance let utterance = AVSpeechUtterance(ssmlRepresentation: text)! utterance.rate = 0.5 // Natural speaking speed utterance.pitchMultiplier = 1.0 utterance.volume = 1.0 utterance.voice = AVSpeechSynthesisVoice(language: "zh-CN") let preferredLanguages = [ "zh-CN" , "zh-TW"] var selectedVoice: AVSpeechSynthesisVoice? for lang in preferredLanguages { if let voice = AVSpeechSynthesisVoice(language: lang) { print(lang) selectedVoice = voice utterance.voice = voice break } } // If no Mandarin voice found, use system default if selectedVoice == nil { selectedVoice = AVSpeechSynthesisVoice(language: nil) lastError = "未偵測到普通話語音包,將使用系統預設語音" print (lastError) } utterance.voice = selectedVoice print(utterance) synthesizer.speak(utterance) } here is my log speakMandarin, <speak>你好!我們來聊聊喜歡的動物吧。你喜歡什麼動物呢?</speak> zh-CN [AVSpeechUtterance 0x1194efb80] String: 你好!我們來聊聊喜歡的動物吧。你喜歡什麼動物呢? Voice: [AVSpeechSynthesisVoice 0x104ceff90] Language: zh-CN, Name: Tingting, Quality: Default [com.apple.voice.compact.zh-CN.Tingting] Rate: 0.50 Volume: 1.00 Pitch Multiplier: 1.00 Delays: Pre: 0.00(s) Post: 0.00(s)
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Activity
Sep ’25
WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab summary (Part 1 of 3)
(Note: this is part 1 of a 3 part posting. See Part 2 or Part 3) At WWDC25 we launched a new type of Lab event for the developer community - Group Labs. A Group Lab is a panel Q&A designed for a large audience of developers. Group Labs are a unique opportunity for the community to submit questions directly to a panel of Apple engineers and designers. Here are the highlights from the WWDC25 Group Lab for Camera & Photos. WWDC25 Camera & Photos group lab ran for one hour at 6 PM PST on Tuesday June 10th, 2025 Introductory kick-off questions Question 1 Tell us a little about the new AVFoundation Capture APIs we've made available in the new iOS 26 developer preview? Cinematic Capture API (strong/weak focus, tracking focus)(scene monitoring)(simulated aperture)(dog/cat heads/groupIDs) Camera Controls and AirPod Stem Clicks Spatial Audio and Studio Quality AirPod Mics in Camera Lens Smudge Detection Exposure and Focus Rect of Interest Question 2 I built QR code scanning into my app, but on newer iPhones I have to hold the phone very far away from the QR code, otherwise the image is blurry and it doesn't scan. Why is this happening and how can I fix it? Every year, the cameras get better and better as we push the state of the art on iPhone photography and videography. This sometimes results in changes to the characteristics of the lenses. min focus distance newer phones have multiple lenses automatic switching behavior Use virtual device like the builtInDualWide or built in Triple, rather than just the builtInWide Set the videoZoomFactor to 2. You're done. Question 3 Last year, we saw some exciting new APIs introduced in AVFoundation in the health space. With Constant Color photography, developers can take pictures that have constant color regardless of ambient lighting. There are some further advancements this year. Davide, could you tell us about them? constant color photography is mean to remove the "tone mapping" applied to photograph captured with camera app, usually incldsuing artistic intent, and instead try to be a close as possible to the real color of the scene, regardless of the illumination constant color images could be captured in HEIF anf JPEG laste year. this year we are adding Support for the DICOM medical imaging photo format. It is a fomrat used by the health industry to store images related to medical subjects like MRI, skin problems, xray and so on. It's writable and also readable format on all OS26, supported through AVCapturePhotoOutput APIs and through the coregraphics api. for coregrapphics there is a new DICOM entry in the property dictionary which includes all the dicom availbale and defined propertie in a file. finder will also display all those in the info panel (Address why a developer would want to use it) - not for regualr picture taking apps. for those HEIF and JPEG are the preferred delivery format. use dicom if your app produces output that are health related, that you can also share with health providers or your doctors Main session developer questions Question 1 LiDAR vs. Dual Camera depth generation: Which resolution does the LiDAR sensor natively have (iPhone 16 Pro) and when to prefer LiDAR over Dual Camera? Both report formats with output resolutions (we don't advertise sensor resolution) Lidar vs Dual, etc: Lidar: Best for absolute depth, real world scale and computer vision Dual, etc: relative, disparity-based, less power, photo effects Also see: 2022 WWDC session "Discovery advancements in iOS camera capture: Depth, focus and multitasking" Question 2 Can true depth and lidar camera run at 60fps? Lidar can do 30fps (edited) Front true depth can do 60fps. Question 3 What’s the first class way to use PhotoKit to reimplement a high performance photo grid? We’ve been using a LazyVGrid and the photos caching manager, but are never able to hit the holy trinity (60hz, efficient memory footprint, minimal flashes of placeholder/empty cells) use the PHCachingImageManager to get media content delivered before you need to display it specify the size you need for grid sized display set the options PHVideoRequestOptionsDeliveryModeFastFormat, PHImageRequestOptionsDeliveryModeFastFormat and PHImageRequestOptionsResizeModeFast Question 4 For rending live preview of video stream, Is there performance overhead from using async and Swift UI for image updates vs UIViewRepresentable + AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer.self? AVCaptureVideoPreviewLayer is the most efficient display path Use VDO + AVSampleBufferDisplayLayer if you need to modify the image data Swift UI image is optimized for static image content Question 5 Is there a way to configure the AVFoundation BuiltInLiDarDepthCamera mode to provide a depth map as accurate as ARKit at close range? The AVCaptureDepthDataOutput supports filtering that reduces noise and fills in invalid values. Consider using this for smoother depth maps Question 6 Pyramid-based photo editing in core image (such as adobe camera raw highlights and shadows)? First off you may want to look a the builtin filter called CIHighlightShadowAdjust Also the noise reduction in the CIRawFilter uses a pyramid-based algorithm. You can also write your own pyramid-based algorithms by taking an input image: down sample it by two multiply times using imageByApplyingAffineTransform apply additional CIKernels to each downsampled image as needed. use a custom CIKernel to combine the results. Question 7 Is the best way to integrate an in-app camera for a “non-camera” app UIImagePickerController? Yes, UIImagePickerController provides system-provided UI for capturing photos and movies. Question 8 Hello, my question is on Deferred Photo Processing? Say I have a photo capture app that adds a CIFilter to the capture. How can I take advantage of Deferred Photo Processing? Since I don’t know how to detect when the deferred captured photo is ready CIFilter can be called on the final at that point Photo will have to be re-inserted into the Photo library as adjustment Question 9 For shipping photo style assets in the app that need transparency what is the best format to use? JPEG2000? will moving to this save a lot of space comapred to PNG or other options? If you want lossless compression PNG is good and supports unpremutiplied alpha If you want lossy compression HEIF supports premutiplied or unpremutiplied alpha (Note: this is part 1 of a 3 part posting. See Part 2 or Part 3)
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Activity
Jul ’25
PHPickerViewController Not Offering public.hevc UTI for a Known HEVC Video
I'm working on an app where a user needs to select a video from their Photos library, and I need to get the original, unmodified HEVC (H.265) data stream to preserve its encoding. The Problem I have confirmed that my source videos are HEVC. I can record a new video with my iPhone 15 Pro Max camera set to "High Efficiency," export the "Unmodified Original" from Photos on my Mac, and verify that the codec is MPEG-H Part2/HEVC (H.265). However, when I select that exact same video in my app using PHPickerViewController, the itemProvider does not list public.hevc as an available type identifier. This forces me to fall back to a generic movie type, which results in the system providing me with a transcoded H.264 version of the video. Here is the debug output from my app after selecting a known HEVC video: ⚠️ 'public.hevc' not found. Falling back to generic movie type (likely H.264). What I've Tried My code explicitly checks for the public.hevc identifier in the registeredTypeIdentifiers array. Since it's not found, my HEVC-specific logic is never triggered. Here is a minimal version of my PHPickerViewControllerDelegate implementation: import UniformTypeIdentifiers // ... inside the Coordinator class ... func picker(_ picker: PHPickerViewController, didFinishPicking results: [PHPickerResult]) { picker.dismiss(animated: true) guard let result = results.first else { return } let itemProvider = result.itemProvider let hevcIdentifier = "public.hevc" let identifiers = itemProvider.registeredTypeIdentifiers print("Available formats from itemProvider: \(identifiers)") if identifiers.contains(hevcIdentifier) { print("✅ HEVC format found, requesting raw data...") itemProvider.loadDataRepresentation(forTypeIdentifier: hevcIdentifier) { (data, error) in // ... process H.265 data ... } } else { print("⚠️ 'public.hevc' not found. Falling back to generic movie type (likely H.264).") itemProvider.loadFileRepresentation(forTypeIdentifier: UTType.movie.identifier) { url, error in // ... process H.264 fallback ... } } } My Environment Device: iPhone 15 Pro Max iOS Version: iOS 18.5 Xcode Version: 16.2 My Questions Are there specific conditions (e.g., the video being HDR/Dolby Vision, Cinematic, or stored in iCloud) under which PHPickerViewController's itemProvider would intentionally not offer the public.hevc type identifier, even for an HEVC video? What is the definitive, recommended API sequence to guarantee that I receive the original, unmodified data stream for a video asset, ensuring that no transcoding to H.264 occurs during the process? Any insight into why public.hevc might be missing from the registeredTypeIdentifiers for a known HEVC asset would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
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Activity
Jul ’25
UIViewController + AVPlayerLayer + AVPlayer cannot AirPlay to HomePod on tvOS 18.5, but AVPlayerViewController + AVPlayer is ok
1, Devices Apple TV HD tvOS 18.5 (22L572) Mode(A1625) HomePod Gen1 OS18.5 (22L572) 2, Test cases: 2.1 UIViewController + AVPlayerLayer + AVPlayer Result: Can not AirPlay to HomePod Sample code for UIViewController + AVPlayer 2.1 AVPlayerViewController + AVPlayer Result: Can AirPlay to HomePod Sample code for AVPlayerViewController + AVPlayer
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401
Activity
Aug ’25