Originally published December 2022. Updated October 2025 to reflect Apple’s iOS 17 implementation of limited sideloading in the EU. Two years later, the early concerns about fragmentation and degraded user experience have largely proven right.

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Among those criticisms that are frequently invoked on behalf of the practice of sideloading apps on iPhone is one that appears otherwise obvious: if you don’t want to sideload an app, then don’t.

It’s a tempting proposition — leave it up to the user as to where they’d rather download their apps from. But beneath that seemingly simple elegance is a reality that is much more complex and multifaceted, because sideloading is not simply some lone feature that can be turned on or off by Apple willy-nilly. It is rather a fundamental shift in the nature of how the iPhone as a device works that would radically change what people anticipate from it from the very outset and remake the entire experience of it as a device.

Yesterday, I discussed some of the questions that Apple engineers would need to answer in complying with the EU’s Digital Markets Act: What is a sideloaded app? Does it gain access to system APIs and privileges? How is its privacy protected when it is not from the App Store? These aren’t trivial questions; they impact almost everything in iOS.

On the Android platform, apps that are sideloaded are treated almost identically to those apps that are downloaded from the Play Store itself. Sideloaded apps also have the ability to present users with notifications, access the device’s microphone and camera functionality, and even integrate strongly within the system design itself. Should Apple follow a similar approach, it would then inevitably lead to developers ending up with a decision to abandon the App Store altogether and concentrate on creating proprietary distribution streams themselves instead. This shift in tactics would inevitably mean that users would end up with fewer choices open to them rather than more.

The App Store is no gem itself, of course—far from it. There are times when scams creep through the cracks and go undetected. Enforcement is spotty at best, and Apple’s ground rules can sometimes be seemingly arbitrary rather than clear-cut. Yet with these numerous flaws and defects notwithstanding, I still see that the App Store consistently provides a ground level of confidence and certainty that cannot be matched across the entire industry as a whole. And I must admit that I can tolerate and accept its defects so much easier than I ever would be able to with so many different incumbent systems creating chaos whenever I switch back and forth.

Apple cannot afford to do without the App Store quite simply right now, and this is equally as true for its customers as it is for it. The App Store is more than a commercial proposition; it is actually the very foundation of what makes the iPhone’s sense of self. Without the App Store as part of the equation on this device, it becomes simply a very expensive camera with no sense of core or direction.

Just think of the practical outcome. Meta, one of Apple’s loudest critics, would be able to flick WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook from the App Store within a few minutes, diverting downloads to its own unregulated platforms. The same would be with Spotify, Telegram, and others. What follows is not competition, but fragmentation.

Even in a scenario where you yourself never bother taking the step to download a sideloaded app on your device, the effects of this phenomenon will nonetheless spread and reach you. When leading devs begin to abandon traditional App Store protocol, it is probable that we would have no choice as ordinary users to do so as well. Updating applications would become a nightmare scavenger hunt experience — with WhatsApp downloadable on one particular site here, Spotify on another site there, a home-security program on a third site altogether — with new login info needed for all of these, as well as accompanying risks and points of weakness.

There is no question that some subset of developers would certainly gain immensely from the practice of sideloading. Apple’s strict and closed-minded approach to this question has resulted in excluding whole categories of applications — emulators, simulators, and many others that undoubtedly deserve a rightful place and platform for their ingenuity. But it is well to remember that these particular edge cases are not worth more than the wider and far greater expense that would be involved in breaking up the healthy ecosystem that exists to support over a billion people on this planet.

Android is also regularly used as a chief counterexample when people talk about app distribution methods. People commonly say, “Android supports sideloading, and it is okay,” highlighting its flexibility. But the manner in which Android engages with the aspect of sideloading has always been affected due to the high level of fragmentation existing in its own universe. In practice, very few developers actually rely on. Furthermore, even Google’s most aggressive competitors, e.g., Meta, Spotify, and Epic Games, hardly enter open hostilities with the Play Store itself. Instead, when these organizations elect to take on a platform, that platform is mostly Apple. This is mainly because of the powerful influence of Apple’s control over markets, along with its requirements for protecting the integrity of its platform, which are perceived as more significant elements within its own competitive moves.

Mark Zuckerberg’s ongoing and repeated criticism of Apple is not fundamentally about advocating for freedom. Instead, it fundamentally revolves around the concept of leverage in the competitive tech landscape. Meta seeks to access Apple’s extensive platform capabilities while conveniently sidestepping Apple’s guiding principles. They desire the vast reach that comes with such a platform but want to avoid the restraints that those principles impose. If given the opportunity, Mark Zuckerberg would eagerly position himself at the forefront, ready to completely bypass the App Store in its entirety.

Lastly, one should also understand that this is not simply a question of exerting control as a form of exerting power or authority. It is rather based on principles of design coherence and correlative responsibility. The protocol that Apple has developed is constructed at its foundation on a pact of trust between the company and its user base: when you choose to load up some program from the App Store, you may do so with assurance that it will act predictably and reliably.

If that relationship is violated or abrogated, then you are exactly breaking the promise that is central to defining the iPhone experience on behalf of its user base. Freedom in technology is not to do everything. It is to decide what you are not going to compromise on. Sideloading might be presented as a choice, but it enforces it, dispersing what Apple had developed over 15 years into the ordinary, the inconsistent, and the unsafe.