Apple Account Purchase Migration Doesn’t Transfer TestFlight Enrollments

Sean Heber, of The Iconfactory:

It appears that Apple’s new account migration stuff does NOT work for TestFlight access. That by itself is fine - whatever. The problem here is that it appears when someone does an account migration, it kind of half-migrates TestFlight somehow.

People are telling us their new email address to invite but TestFlight thinks they’re already a tester with that email address! So you can’t just reinvite them. It seems we have to filter for the user, remove them, then add them as a new tester.

Heber subsequently replied to his own thread:

lol - update. We tried this with a tester. I removed them from TestFlight and then re-added with their new email. They got the invite and then the TestFlight app said they can’t be added because they’re already on TestFlight with the email address that was just invited.

The workaround was to generate a public TestFlight link and use that. My guess is it uses some kind of token as a key for that system and not their email address. Seems to work around it. Except now there’s a public link. At least I can limit how many can use it and only those who migrated and need a reinvite will get this link for now.

His colleague Craig Hockenberry:

If you’re hearing from testers about being kicked out of TestFlight because of the new account migration stuff, DO NOT update their email. It’s a lot of work and will not help them.

For now, you MUST give them a public link, even if it’s a private beta.

TestFlight enrollment is on the list of things that you’re warned are not included with migration (the other two are personalized recommendations and the ability to edit App Store reviews you’ve left with your secondary account), but it sounds like the post-migration TestFlight situation is a little worse than just “not migrated, start over”. You need some actual assistance from the developer of each app you’re testing. (I’m an edge case, to be sure, but I’m enrolled in about 30 active TestFlights across Mac and iOS.)

Still, though, it seems like practical experience with this purchase migration has gone well for almost everyone. I think Apple might have nailed this.

Update, 14 February: Apple has added a new requirement before proceeding with migration:

You can’t migrate purchases if your secondary Apple Account is used with TestFlight for testing beta versions of apps from a developer. Open TestFlight and select Stop Testing for each app to remove it from your account.

★ Thursday, 13 February 2025