Apple has made the decision to delay the launch of its new SharePlay feature in iOS 15. The new feature will be available in a later update to iOS 15, Apple says, and will not be included in the initial public release of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, tvOS 15, and macOS Monterey.
Apple says that SharePlay has been disabled in developer beta 6 versions of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and tvOS 15, and will be disabled in the upcoming beta 6 release of macOS Monterey.
To allow developers to continue to test SharePlay integration with their applications in iOS 15, Apple is releasing a new SharePlay development profile. Apple explains:
SharePlay has been disabled for use in the developer beta 6 versions of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and tvOS 15, and will be disabled in the upcoming beta 6 release of macOS Monterey. SharePlay will also be disabled for use in their initial releases this fall. SharePlay will be enabled for use again in future developer beta releases and will launch to the public in software updates later this fall. Your team can continue developing SharePlay support for your apps by installing this development profile.
We’re thrilled with the high level of enthusiasm we’ve seen from the developer community for SharePlay, and we can’t wait to bring it to users so that they can experience your apps with their friends and family in a whole new way.
We appreciate how many teams have been hard at work building SharePlay experiences and to ensure there is no interruption in your development, we have provided a SharePlay Development Profile which will enable successful creation and reception of GroupSessions via the Group Activities API.
If your team plans to submit an update to your app for the initial release of these platforms, please remove the GroupActivities entitlement. We will provide guidance when SharePlay is re-enabled in a future developer beta, at which point we encourage you to include the GroupActivities entitlement in your code.
SharePlay was touted as one of the leading features of iOS 15 when Apple announced the update at WWDC in June. The feature allows users to watch movies and TV shows in sync over FaceTime, collaborate on Apple Music playlists, share their screens, and more.
The delay means that SharePlay will come in a subsequent update to iOS 15, such as iOS 15.1 or iOS 15.2. Apple has not offered any additional detail on the reasoning for the delay.
Apple has not yet commented on whether Universal Control, a headlining feature of macOS Monterey and iPadOS 15, will be available at launch. The feature has not been available in any of the betas thus far.
Source: 9TO5Google
