Introducing Helm for iOS

Today, we are super excited to announce the first ever version of Helm for iOS on the App Store! I know some of you have been in the beta for a while now and we would like to thank you for your patience and your amazing feedback, it has been fundamental to building the experience that we are shipping today!

In this announcement post, we will go through what you should expect from the iOS app and what features are available today.

What to expect from the iOS app?

Ever since we started building the Helm macOS app that you all know and love, we have been thinking about making an iOS app that allows users to manage their App Store apps on the go. However, the more we talked about it, the more we realized that this wasn’t a trivial task and we very quickly agreed that we could not just port features like by like from the macOS app and call it a day. As you know, our mission is not to just build a wrapper around the App Store Connect API, but to instead provide you with the best possible experience when shipping your apps and tackle the most common pain points developers have when doing so.

So we asked ourselves: What are Helm users more likely to do on their phone? The answer was clear: quick, time-sensitive tasks that you need to handle while you’re away from your Mac. And that’s exactly what we have and will continue to build for the mobile version of Helm. While this approach allows us to focus on providing a great on the go experience, one feature at a time, it also means that certain features might never come to the iOS app and will remain unique to the macOS app.

It is also worth noting that Helm is not available on iPad devices for now. The reason for this is that we want to take the time to build the best possible experience for iPad users, as the platform is highly portable while also excelling at content tasks, but that’s a story for another day 😅.

Onboarding, made simple

While we have made it possible to configure your account’s credentials using the iOS app, we still recommend setting up Helm on your Mac first. This will allow downloading the API keys and importing them into the app a lot quicker than it would be possible using the iOS app.

For all users that have already configured Helm on their Mac, the onboarding process on iOS is a breeze! You open the app, the credentials are already safely synced from your Mac through the device’s keychain and you are ready to start using the app. It really is that simple:

Focused, on-the-go version editor

Editing your app’s details, getting improvement suggestions and auto translating to all supported languages are some of the most used features in the macOS app. And, as you might have guessed, we have made sure to include them in the iOS app as well!

However, we did it in a way that is focused, keeping the actions that you are most likely to do on the go at the forefront. From updating release notes to uploading screenshots, the iOS app’s editing experince really packs a punch!

We also allow you to release, select a build, cancel a submission and reject a build directly from the app, among many other useful actions that you might do on the go.

The Helm Passport

Let’s talk about one of the most exciting features, and one of the features that is unique to the iOS app (for now 😅): The Helm Passport.

It is common for developers to add people they meet as beta testers to their apps through TestFlight links. While this is the easiest way to add beta testers to a TestFlight group, it also adds all testers anonymously. This makes it incredibly hard to keep track of who you met, what app or company they worked for (if any), and whether they are currently testing any of your apps.

That’s why we came up with the concept of the Helm Passport. You create a so-called “passport” with your name, email and the app that you build and you can then allow users to scan it with their phone. All users that scan the passport will be added as “stamps” to your passport and you will be able to quickly add them to any of your TestFlight groups, now or in the future!

No app? No problem!

You might be wondering, what if I don’t have Helm installed? Can I collect a stamp quickly or do I have to go through the whole onboarding flow to do so? Well, you’ll be happy to know that we have built an App Clip that allows you to collect beta tester details without even having the app installed! 😱

TestFlight management

We can’t really talk about Helm without mentioning TestFlight. We have brought the same great experience that we have on macOS to the iOS app, but with some great mobile features that make it even easier to manage your TestFlight groups:

• Native tester invite flow, with support for adding from Contacts and Helm Passport stamps.
• QR code support for sharing TestFlight group links.
• Numerous options to share TestFlight group links, including copy to clipboard, airdrop and messages.

Future plans

We have a lot of exciting plans for the future of Helm on mobile and, in the coming weeks and months, we will be working on making more features available on the iOS app while also working on the macOS app to provide you with the best possible experience when shipping your apps.