Apple Push Notification service (APNs), previously known as Apple Push Service (APS), is a platform notification service created by

Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Comput ...

that enables third party application developers to send notification data to applications installed on Apple devices. The notification information sent can include badges, sounds, newsstand updates, or custom text alerts. It was first launched with iOS 3 on June 17, 2009. APNs support for local applications was later added to the

Mac OS X macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

API An application programming interface (API) is a connection between computers or between computer programs. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how to build ...

beginning with the release of Mac OS X 10.7 ("Lion"). Support for website notifications was later added with the release of Mac OS X 10.9 ("Mavericks").

History

Apple announced the service on June 9, 2008 with an original stated release for that September; however, as stated by Scott Forstall at the iOS 3.0 preview event on March 17, 2009, the rollout was delayed after a decision to restructure the APNs for scalability purposes due to the allegedly "overwhelming" response to the announcement of the APNs. At both events, Forstall stated that push notifications better conserve battery than

background process A background process is a computer process that runs ''behind the scenes'' (i.e., in the background) and without user intervention. Typical tasks for these processes include logging, system monitoring, scheduling, and user notification. On a Wind ...

es (which are used in pull technology) for receiving notifications. APNs was first launched together with iOS 3.0 on June 17, 2009. The release of iOS 5.0 included a Notification Center, adding support for receiving and reading local notifications in a single place. APNs was also added as an API to Mac OS X 10.7 ("Lion") so that developers could begin updating their third-party applications and start utilizing the service. Support was later improved in OS X 10.8 ("Mountain Lion") with the introduction of a Notification Center. As with iOS 5.0, the improvement allowed users to manage and read their received notifications in a single location. The release of OS X 10.9 ("Mavericks") included

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7.0, which added support for accepting and receiving APNs notifications from websites that the user granted permission to. In December 2023, concerns arose regarding a potential privacy and surveillance loopholes involving push notifications delivered through APNs. US Senator Ron Wyden revealed, through a letter to the Department of Justice, that both the US government and foreign law enforcement could demand user data from Apple related to push notifications.

Technical details

In 2014, the maximum size allowed for a notification payload sent through the binary interface was increased from 256 bytes to 2 kilobytes. In December 2015, a new

HTTP/2 HTTP/2 (originally named HTTP/2.0) is a major revision of the HTTP network protocol used by the World Wide Web. It was derived from the earlier experimental SPDY protocol, originally developed by Google. HTTP/2 was developed by the HTTP Working ...

provider API was released by Apple, effectively replacing the now-legacy binary interface. The maximum notification payload size allowed using the HTTP/2 API is 4 kilobytes. Apple shut down the legacy binary API at the end of March 2021. The HTTP/2 provider for APNs uses TCP port 443 as the main port of communication, but developers are also allowed to use TCP port 2197 if outbound access to port 443 is blocked by firewalls.

References

External links

*
Apple Push Notification Service Documentation

iOS: Understanding Notifications
{{Mac OS X Push Notification Service IOS MacOS Push technology

History

Technical details

See also

References

External links