Review status for a long time. That's really frustrating.

Question

Created 2w

Replies 3

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Hello everyone,

I wanted to share an experience and ask if others have seen the same. Our app has been in “Waiting for Review” for 12 days, across 3 resubmission rounds. Each round only involved a small, specific change that App Review asked for.

In the past, resubmissions with minor changes were reviewed within hours since the app was already in the queue. This time the wait has been much longer with little movement, even after an expedited request was approved.

Is this a common experience lately for resubmissions? Any insight on what causes a resubmission to take significantly longer than a first review would be appreciated.

Thank you.

Answered by Etresoft in 910777022

Is this a common experience lately for resubmissions?

Yes. What you describe has been described by other people here in the forums, over 100 times a day, for about the past 300 days.

Any insight on what causes a resubmission to take significantly longer than a first review would be appreciated.

Apple has publicly said that it's using AI for reviews now. So any developer activity could be a source of training data. So which submission should the AI engine pass to a human reviewer? A submission that's already failed 3 times, or a submission that hasn't already failed?

In the first case, a reviewer has looked at 3 submissions with nothing to show for it. Had that reviewer spent those 3 sessions on other apps that didn't fail, they could have published 3 updated apps. So it would make sense for the resubmission queue to be slower. I don't know if Apple's app review system actually works this way, but if it did, it would result in more submissions being approved.

From what I see here in the forums, developers try to resubmit as quickly as possible. They also submit multiple developer support requests. And they submit expedited review requests for updates that aren't time-sensitive. The result seems to be ever-longer wait times.

My recommendation would be to try to break that cycle. Instead of resubmitting quickly, take the opportunity to honestly pre-review the app and address any potential problems. After all, it's not like it's going to be reviewed anytime soon anyway. May as well get some value from the delay by improving the app. And maybe that will result in a different pattern for the AI and a different result going forward.

Answer 1 · 2w

Etresoft OP

2w

Accepted Answer

Is this a common experience lately for resubmissions?

Yes. What you describe has been described by other people here in the forums, over 100 times a day, for about the past 300 days.

Any insight on what causes a resubmission to take significantly longer than a first review would be appreciated.

Apple has publicly said that it's using AI for reviews now. So any developer activity could be a source of training data. So which submission should the AI engine pass to a human reviewer? A submission that's already failed 3 times, or a submission that hasn't already failed?

In the first case, a reviewer has looked at 3 submissions with nothing to show for it. Had that reviewer spent those 3 sessions on other apps that didn't fail, they could have published 3 updated apps. So it would make sense for the resubmission queue to be slower. I don't know if Apple's app review system actually works this way, but if it did, it would result in more submissions being approved.

From what I see here in the forums, developers try to resubmit as quickly as possible. They also submit multiple developer support requests. And they submit expedited review requests for updates that aren't time-sensitive. The result seems to be ever-longer wait times.

My recommendation would be to try to break that cycle. Instead of resubmitting quickly, take the opportunity to honestly pre-review the app and address any potential problems. After all, it's not like it's going to be reviewed anytime soon anyway. May as well get some value from the delay by improving the app. And maybe that will result in a different pattern for the AI and a different result going forward.

Answer 2 · 2w

ArifMete OP

2w

Thank you for your detailed answers.

Answer 3 · 2w

ArifMete OP

2w

Thank you for your detailed answers. My app was rejected three times purely for simple reasons, all of which were related to Metadata. Apple and the developer review team are really not doing a good job in this regard. For every single case, the app gets pushed back to 'Waiting for Review'. We cannot reach them, and they do not respond to emails. I know this initial part is handled by AI.
My main criticism is that the 'In Review' process is not managed well or efficiently. I was already in the queue and had reached the 'In Review' status. A real human reviewer evaluated only 1 out of the 3 files I uploaded over hours, resulting in an incomplete review and another rejection. There is not a single issue with the technical side of the application, nor have we received any feedback regarding code or functionality.