You’ll be able to install apps on your iPhone from outside the App Store sooner than you imagine.

Install applications on iPhone from outside the App Store, in a practice known as sideloading, is impossible today. However, Apple will be forced to allow this in the not too distant future due to Digital Markets Act (DMA) of the European Union. And the residents of Cupertino would have already determined when such an opportunity would be allowed.

According to Mark Gurman, from Bloombergin its Sunday newsletter Turn onEuropean users will be able to do sideloading applications on iPhone starting from the first half of 2024. The well-known journalist does not name a specific date, but at least indicates a time frame to which attention should be paid.

What Gurman reports is far from a surprise. After all, Apple’s App Store is one of the “essential services” that must comply with the Digital Markets Act. However, what is new is that block participants are already working to comply with legal requirements. Especially considering that historically they have prohibited the installation of applications from third-party sources.

It is for this reason that we assumed that the company would try to fight the effective implementation of the measure. But everything indicates that Tim Cook’s people will give in to EU regulators, which will lead to sideloading on iPhone become reality in a few months.

He sideloading coming to iPhone in the first months of 2024

It’s also no surprise that installing apps from outside the App Store will be available in Europe from the first half of 2024. When the European Commission confirmed the companies and services covered by the Digital Markets Act, it stated that They had until March next year. comply with the obligations established by regulations.

It is not yet known how Apple will implement sideloading on the iPhone, although the company doesn’t intend to leave it to chance. According to Mark Gurman, Cupertino residents are working to implement “tightly controlled” system through which the public will be allowed to install applications not hosted on the App Store.

While no further details are offered, the experience will likely be very different from what exists on Android. Apple has repeatedly stated that permission sideloading This would break the iPhone’s privacy and security model.

So don’t expect an equivalent to F-Droid or APKMirror for iOS anytime soon. Regardless of the technical details, if Apple allows apps to be installed outside of the App Store, it will do so its own way.

The most important change in the history of the App Store

Gurman himself commented late last year that one of the alternatives Apple was considering was to allow sideloading on iPhone should have presented verification system. This would mean that developers who want to offer their apps without going through the App Store would first have to let Cupertino residents review them and give approval.

Of course, this change, the most notable in the history of iOS software distribution, won’t come for free. Apple could charge a commission creators, necessarily to compensate for the inability to take a share of purchases in the application.

Let’s see if this is true. He sideloading apps will come to iPhone via update iOS 17 regionally limited. This also appears to involve changes to Messages, although it’s unclear whether this will be related to the requirement to open iMessage.