This week, Apple delighted many long-time users of the App Store by introducing a long-awaited feature. After years of requests, the company has rolled out a tool that allows users to transfer purchases from one Apple account to another. However, there are several specific criteria that both accounts must satisfy.
Apple specifies the following conditions under which transfer of purchases cannot occur:
- Both Apple Accounts must not be child accounts created via Family Sharing.
- Neither account may currently be associated with migrated purchases. If you reverse a migration from a secondary account, you will be unable to migrate purchases again for a year. Learn how to undo a migration.
- Purchases cannot be migrated if either the primary or secondary Apple Account contains music library data.
- If an Apple One subscription is configured to provide iCloud storage to another account, migration is not possible. Explore more about Apple One and iCloud storage.
- Any primary account that has never made purchases or downloaded apps for free is ineligible for migration.
- Purchases cannot be moved from a deleted or disabled Apple Account.
- If an Apple Account is locked or disabled, migration of purchases is not allowed. Discover what steps to take if your account is locked or disabled.
- Neither account should have special access to apps or content, such as accounts participating in the VPP program for access to specific applications through their employer.
New users attempting the purchase migration also found an additional complication related to TestFlight. Specifically, if you have beta-tested software linked to the account from which you wish to migrate purchases, access to those apps will not transfer to the receiving Apple account.
As a result, Apple has introduced a new prerequisite that must be met prior to transferring purchases between accounts.
Migration of purchases is not permitted if your secondary Apple Account has been used with TestFlight to beta test developer apps. To remove apps from your account, open TestFlight and select Stop Testing for each app.
Additionally, Apple has revised its support documentation related to purchase migration, clarifying that the 15-day processing rule for purchases applies solely to two regions:
In Mainland China and South Korea, you may need to wait up to 15 days for all purchases made with your Apple Account balance to fully process.
This detail about South Korea and Mainland China was not included in earlier versions of the document.
Finally, Apple has provided clarification concerning Family Sharing:
Purchases can still be transferred if you previously indicated your secondary account as a separate Apple Account for sharing purchases with your primary account via Family Sharing.
Have you attempted to migrate purchases between your Apple accounts? In my case, the migration attempt failed due to not fulfilling one or more of the criteria, although the system does not specify what needs to be addressed. As of this morning, I can no longer see the option to initiate a migration — even after I stopped testing all TestFlight apps.
