“Provide a more complete, rich user experience”

Feb 13, 2015 08:05 GMT  ·  By

In a brief notice posted on its Developer portal, Apple has waved the 2GB limitation for files submitted through iTunes Connect, and has instated a new file-size cap of 4GB.

Phones are getting bigger and so are the storage requirements for things like photos, music and apps. Games make up the most of the App Store, and as we all know, 3D titles can take up a fair amount of space on our iDevices. Plus, the better the graphics, the more gigs it will take up.

What this means for developers

Apple hasn’t yet set its mind to address the situation from a hardware standpoint (at least not that we know of), but it does want developers to be able to provide an even better experience to the user with even heftier app binaries.

According to a fresh post on the News and Updates section of the Dev Center, “The size limit of an app package submitted through iTunes Connect has increased from 2 GB to 4 GB, so you can include more media in your submission and provide a more complete, rich user experience upon installation.”

The Mac maker assures registrants that the network delivery size limit - currently capped at 100MB - will not be affected in any way by this change.

What this means for you

As far as the end-user is concerned, this is actually great news. Titles like Infinity Blade or CRS Racing, as well as shooters and RPGs all require massive amounts of visual resources to display sleek action.

The new allowance will not only boost graphics at a pixel level, it will also enable smoother frame rates for some titles, and it will also make it possible for a developer to include more cinematics and cutscenes for you to enjoy.

On the down-side, bigger apps will also mean decreased performance for some devices (generally the oldest ones will suffer the most). Many users are already complaining that their storage is almost close to 0 once a week, so for them, this will hardly make any change.