It's been almost exactly a year since I first posted here about Apollo, a little new Reddit app for iOS on the block, and you all really received it with open arms. Thanks for an absolutely amazing last year.

Today comes Apollo 1.3, the notifications update! It includes (you guessed it!) notifications as the core part of the update, which has probably been the most requested feature for Apollo. It took a long time to get right, but I'm super stoked with how it came out. They're fast, super battery efficient, and almost like a mini-app in themselves, as you can reply, upvote, downvote, view context, and more right from the notification, so you don't even have to open the app most of the time, you can do everything right from the notification in your lockscreen or when it drops down from the top. You can even customize the sound with a bunch of great options, like a turkey gobble or a penguin… scree? (There's normal noises too.)

One part to mention early is that the update includes the dreaded, hated, loathed subscriptions. But if you're not interested in notifications you can completely ignore them. Long story short, push notifications require a server (it's where they're "pushed" from), and servers have ongoing monthly costs. I really couldn't afford just to give it away with Pro, and I didn't want to move Pro to a subscription model, so I added an extra feature pack called "Apollo Ultra" that you can choose, that comes with some notifications and some extra things!

Now I'll copy-paste a little FAQ I made up that explains more, but I'm happy to answer further questions too if you have any! I'll chill in this thread.

Apollo 1.3

Notifications have been notably absent from Apollo from the get-go, but it's been because they're a really hard thing to do, and to do right. Long story short, there's a few ways to do them. You can do it completely on device, but this affects device battery life, and causes substantial delays in delivery as it can only fetch so often. An option that fixes these downsides is to do all the work on an external server, which doesn't affect battery life, and results in instant delivery. Here's a video of Scott Forstall talking about server advantages way back in iPhone OS 3.

On top of all this, recent versions of iOS really also souped up the power of what notifications can do on the device, but weirdly a lot of apps don't take advantage of that (look at iMessage for an app that does, how you can view your messages and reply inline).

For Apollo, I really didn't want to cut corners, so I've spent the last few months building up a really awesome solution with a dedicated server to handle the notifications, as well as taking advantage of everything iOS has to offer for making notifications powerful. The result is Apollo notifications are super battery efficient, super fast, and crazy powerful. You can view an entire conversation's context from the notification, reply, upvote, downvote, and more without ever having to leave the lockscreen. You can even customize the sound of the notification, I like making it sound like a turkey gobble. It's like a mini-app in itself.

Now, to be completely up front with you, servers have ongoing, monthly costs. Yeah, there's no getting around that unfortunately. I'd love to just say "here, everyone who has Pro gets notifications!" but where I made Pro a small, one-time fee, the notifications server and its ongoing costs mean that I'd eventually be in the red on that exchange, and keeping Apollo sustainable and healthy for the future is obviously a massive priority of mine. I want to keep the lights on.

On the flipside, I 100% know, understand and agree with how most feel about subscriptions. They're abused more and more lately, and they're expensive. So I talked it over with the community and I wanted to come up with a reasonable solution to help pay for ongoing server costs, without gouging customers and infuriating them with something crappy.

I knew I couldn't compete with Netflix and whatnot and add another $10/month subscription to users, but as said servers have ongoing costs to me, so I elected to offer an option in the app to pay a meager 99 cents a month and you can have full access to notifications. I really hope you guys can find this reasonable and know I put a ton of work and talk into this update to make it as reasonable as I possibly could. I've worked really hard over the last year to work with the community on Apollo, so please understand that I honestly do really care about the community, and I hope my actions over the last year speak to that even more than my words.

Show me a video of the features!

Okay! https://vimeo.com/297431875

So how do I get notifications?

Notifications are bundled into a new pack called "Apollo Ultra". Hold up! Why not just call it "Apollo Notifications"? Well, I did that at first, but it didn't go so well. Essentially Apple has a rule (3.2.2 subsection ii) that apps can't charge directly for system capabilities like push notifications. Apple very nicely called me and explained that they know there's associated costs with push notifications and the server required for them, but to prevent potential abuse this is a rule they have. They suggested to bundle it in with other features that aren't system capabilities (eg don't bundle it in with AirPlay streaming), and after talking with the community we came up with some simple cool features to add to it that aren't massive deals if you don't have: App Theming (changing the colors of the app around), and some more custom app icons. So the end result is Apollo Ultra is a pack that has notifications, App Theming, and a new custom icon every month.

What does it notify me of?

It notifies you of everything in your Reddit inbox: post replies, comment replies, username mentions, and private messages.

Walk me through your process of building this update.

I started with a thread in the ApolloApp subreddit talking about my plans and to see if it made sense. People seemed to understand the costs and like my concept, so I started building. Then I got some feedback on the UI to make sure it was clear and understandable. Fast forward a bit, it had been tested by the community and everyone seemed to like it, so I submitted it to Apple, and it was unfortunately rejected (but Apple was cool). People gave some suggestions and ideas. I talked with the community and laid out my plans. I talked to Apple on the phone and they were super cool and basically agreed with the plans so I updated the community and got to work. I then submitted it, and Apple approved it! And here we are.

Apollo Pro?

I want to be really, really, really clear that Apollo Pro is not going anywhere, not only that, but it's still the main part of Apollo, and will continue to be indefinitely. Zero plans to change that. So many of you supported Apollo right out of the gates, and the last thing I want to do is give the middle finger to a group of people I owe a ton to. Apollo Ultra is an optional, separate pack that you can get if you want, or ignore if you want. But I have zero plans to move the core of Apollo to a subscription model. The one-time fee model works great, and everyone seems to love it. I don't have any plans to be locking a bunch of extra features into Ultra, and on the flipside I have some really awesome extra features planned for Pro.

Other notification options?

I mentioned the first option up there uses the device to manage notifications, it uses a combination of Background App Refresh and Local Notifications. Effectively it wakes the app up every so often to make fetches to the server to see if there's any new notifications. This has some downsides, notably that all this is performed on the device, which negatively affects battery life (for instance Apple turns this capability off during Low Power Mode). Further, this fetching can only happen periodically (it varies and is decided by iOS, can be 15 minutes to every several hours in frequency) so the notifications themselves can be quite delayed. I had this as an option called "Basic Notifications" in the previous build that was rejected, but don't worry, I plan to add it as an option back, I just wanted to make sure when I submitted this new build everything was clear to Apple and I didn't add any more confusion to potentially get it delayed further. So if you're okay with the above downsides, Apollo will also have a free option for notifications, so please understand that I'm truly trying to be as reasonable about this as possible!

You could merge Pro and Ultra?

I don't really want to move the Pro features to a subscription model, I like how they are now. It would be more streamlined to just have one "pack", yes, but I think in the end this will make everyone happier. For this reason you also don't "automatically" get Pro if you get Ultra, because I don't want to conflate the two, and it introduces a lot of complexity around whether or not it should be removed after the subscription expires.

Still don't like subscriptions, any other options?

You don't have to go by the month, there's a cheaper yearly option for $10, or for a limited time if you really don't like subscriptions there's a lifetime unlock for $20. That price will last for 1 week from today, so act quick if you want it!

I don't want notifications but still want the other stuff or to support you

You can totally get Apollo Ultra and just leave notifications turned off if they're not your cup of tea, you'll still get everything else and help Apollo's development!

Tell me about this custom icon every month.

So I figured if I was going to add extra custom icons (which everyone seems to love) to Ultra, I didn't want to just lazily throw in one I threw together in a few minutes. So I worked with The Iconfactory and commissioned them to build a super sick custom icon. So basically every month you'll get a cool special icon included as part of Ultra. I worked with some other really talented designers to build some other really cool icons (some with pixel art!) so that these icons look really cool. I want this feature to be awesome.

iPad update?!

Notifications took a ton of work. But I'm really glad it's behind me because now I can focus on the iPad update. I'm going to be working on 1.4 and 1.5 in tandem with the iPad update so I'm not just going to disappear for awhile, but I'm really stoked to be able to now have a bunch of time to put into the iPad side of things and making the experience for Apollo and Reddit on the iPad spectacular, I have some really cool ideas. :)

I don't see the 1.3 update in my App Store yet!

It can take up to a few hours sometimes for the update to hit every App Store, so just give it a bit! Sometimes it can also help if you search for the app and go right to its page and hit the "Update" button from there rather than the Updates tab.

Thank You

Just wanted to say a big thank you to everyone who has supported Apollo and allowed this to be my full time job, I'm having a hoot building Apollo and have so much planned for its future, I can't wait to show you, and thanks for making all that possible.

- Christian