Build Ionic 5 apps for apple store

[uzunov]

Hey everyone!
I’m a long time reader, first time poster! (So take it easy on me).

My goal is to build and publish an app for Apple Store, however I don’t have a Mac. Is it possible to do this using a Windows/Linux OS? If so what is the best method/ without too much hustle?
I found old announcements and discussions dating 5+ years and was wondering if it is still valid?

I believe this is the most relevant announcement:

Build Apps in Minutes with Ionic Package

Don’t have a Mac to build an iOS app? No problem! Dan (@dwieeb) has been hard at work getting Ionic Package into public alpha! Ionic Package allows you to create development and production builds of your app that can be submitted to the Apple App Store and Google Play Store, or be installed directly on your friends’, family members’, and colleagues’ devices. Read the full blog post here: http://blog.ionic.io/build-apps-in-minutes-with-ionic-package/ Ready to give Package a test drive? Great! …

I’m using Ionic 5.4.16
Angular 13.2.6

I would also like to point out that is for a company I work for, so my best guess is that Hackintosh is not something that I should use.

Thanks,
Ivan

[Hills90210]

@uzunov

Is it possible to do this using a Windows/Linux OS?

No

@uzunov

what is the best method/ without too much hustle?

Get subscription with Appflow. That allows you to do cloud builds.

[josemarsc-dev]

@uzunov

I would also like to point out that is for a company I work for, so my best guess is that Hackintosh is not something that I should use.

Damn, I was going to sugest just that haha.

An option with little to no hustle would be Ionic AppFlow, but for me is a little pricey.

Another alternative is MacinCloud, I use it to do my iOS builds. It can get pricey too but they do have a Pay-As-You-Go plan which is pretty cheap in my opnion.

[jhonalbert48]

Submitting an App to the iOS App store requires a Paid Apple Developers account

[Tommertom]

Install MacOS on VMWare.
And use that to generate ipa to publish on a paid apple dev account.

I will refrain from commenting who you need to pay what - especially for the VMWare part - for which I recommend using Google to find out the best and cheapest way

[marsnebulasoup]

It is possible to install macOS on a VM for free on Windows using VirtualBox. Somebody made a tool for that: GitHub - myspaghetti/macos-virtualbox: Push-button installer of macOS Catalina, Mojave, and High Sierra guests in Virtualbox for Windows, Linux, and macOS

However, I have done this and it’s a real pain to be honest, but it does work. The problem is that unless you have an extremely good computer, emulators for iPhones will be really slow.

I was not able to connect an external iPhone to the VM to run my app, so this didn’t work out in the end. I just bought up the cheapest used Mac mini I could find on ebay in the end and it’s still faster than the VM.

I’m not sure how VMware’s performance is, but it’s not free either, so you probably can’t do this reasonably for free.

[Gukak]

I’m (was) achieving this with Azure, for free. Requires by the way some configuration…

a good starting point, which will require some updates since things are evolving fast :

Building IOS application using Azure Pipelines

or

Ionic Capacitor: From App to iOS IPA without a Mac

[digimo]

This worked perfectly for me, using the 2nd link ( Ionic Capacitor: From App to iOS IPA without a Mac )