Tell HN: An app is silently installing itself on my iPhone every day

Tell HN: An app is silently installing itself on my iPhone every day

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  • This was happening for me also. 3-4 days in a row it would reinstall in the evening. I’m on a new iPhone that never had the app installed. Automatic downloads wasn’t on, etc. finally noticed that signing out of “Media & Purchases” and then signing in again would make it install almost immediately. Could reliably repeat this any time of day. At one point I preempted the install by long pressing on the Headspace icon and selecting “Cancel Download”. It disappeared and hasn’t been back since.
  • Meanwhile, I can't install an iOS game i bought in 2021 (Azure Saga if it matters) because it's delisted from the app store.

    Damned if you pay them, damned if you don't.

  • Do you have Settings > Apps > App Store > (Automatic Downloads) App Downloads turned on?

    I noticed apps appearing on my Home Screen I’d never heard of before. Turns out with that setting and Family Purchase sharing turned on, every time my wife installed a new app, it installed on my phone too.

    That may not be your exact scenario, but I wonder if turning off that Automatic App Downloads setting (if enabled) changes anything. Could give you a clue, if so.

  • I have the same exact thing happening. I deleted the app a few days ago when was surprised to see it in my app list.

    I had previously downloaded the app but and removed it because I never used it. A few days ago I noticed the app when browsing through my app list and thought maybe I didnt delete it properly, so I made sure to delete it. Then this morning my iPhone updated software versions and I found he Headpsace app again on my home, except this time it was grayed out and waiting for me to go on wifi to download.

    I just deleted it again but am equally dumbfounded

  • I wonder if U2, or Bono, has taken a significant stake in Headspace recently (kidding).
  • My hypothesis is that headspace registered many user notifications and since user notifications trigger an app launch and perhaps you have optimize storage by offloading apps enabled? ios has a quirky app state where some local data exists but the app itself (ipa package) is offloaded
  • Here's a Reddit thread of other people experiencing the same issue: https://www.reddit.com/r/ios/comments/1su82sc/headspace_app_...
  • This isn't the first system bug that primarily was visible due to headspace: https://www.macrumors.com/2017/12/02/ios-11-1-2-date-bug-cra...

    In 2017 it was an endless crash loop caused by any app with local time-based notifications.... Which for almost everyone at the Apple store I visited was meditation apps with daily meditation reminders (in Australia we were among the first to wake up on that affected date. The fix went out before most of the remaining world woke up)

    I wonder if the daily reminder is triggering a reinstall? Perhaps try disabling the reminders before uninstalling.

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