App-store packaging: your published site as an iOS and Android project
From the builder's Console you can download a published site as a Capacitor project that opens in Xcode and Android Studio, with icons, splash screens and two native features already wired in. Alongside it comes a store-readiness checklist worked out from the site itself. Anticode never submits anything, creates store accounts or holds your signing keys; that part stays with you.
Before you start: do you need a store at all?
Every Anticode site can already be installed from the browser with its own icon and window, which costs nothing and needs no review. Website to mobile app packaging for a store listing earns its effort when customers expect to search for you there, or when you want native touches like a share sheet. Be honest with yourself about the review risk too: both Apple and Google turn down apps that are just a website in a frame. The checklist below says so plainly rather than letting you find out after weeks of work.
The checklist
Open the Console, choose App stores, and the checklist is read from your published site. Each item is a pass, a fail, a warning, or something only you can do, and the summary line counts them: to fix, to check, only you can do.
| Item | Passes when |
|---|---|
| Privacy policy | A link on the site mentions privacy; both stores ask for a privacy policy address |
| Contact details | There's an email or phone link, or a contact or booking form |
| Leftover filler | No dummy text, example addresses, 555 numbers or sample names, which reviewers reject on sight |
| Store name | The page title fits the stores' 30 characters (a warning otherwise) |
| Description | A meta description of at least 30 characters to start the listings from |
| Privacy answers | Yours to do: what to declare in Apple's App Privacy and Google's Data safety, filled in from your form fields |
| Minimum functionality | Never passes. It's marked high risk for a single short page with no booking form, and a warning otherwise, with what would help |
The owner items cover what no tool can do for you: an App ID you won't change, membership of the Apple Developer Program, a Google Play developer account and its closed-testing rule for new accounts, a Mac with Xcode, signing, screenshots, listings, ratings and export compliance. Fees and Google's testing numbers aren't quoted, because they change; the checklist tells you to check them.
The download
Set the Name under the icon (up to 30 characters) and an App ID, a reversed domain you own such as com.yourbusiness.app. It's permanent once the app is in a store; until you change it from the default, the checklist warns you. Then press Download project to get <slug>-app.zip:
- capacitor.config.json
- Your app ID and name, and the live site's address as the page the app loads
- ios/ and android/
- Capacitor's own templates, edited as its tools would edit them: bundle identifier, display name, icons at every size, launch screen and splash in your colours
- www/
- An offline screen in your colours shown when there's no connection, the icon, and the script for the native features
- store/
- A 1024-pixel App Store icon, a 512-pixel Play icon and a 1024 by 500 Play feature graphic
- README.md and STORE-CHECKLIST.md
- How to install, sync, run, sign and upload, and the checklist as it stood when you downloaded
Two native features
Because reviewers reject apps that add nothing to the website, the project adds two things a browser tab can't do. A share button in the bottom corner opens the phone's own share sheet with the page's title and address. On a booking form's thank-you page, when the booked time is more than an hour away, a Remind me an hour before button asks for notification permission at that moment and schedules one reminder on the phone. Nothing leaves the device. Either can be turned off with a setting at the top of the feature script, and the README says how.
How the app stays current
The app loads your live site rather than a bundled copy, so publishing a change in Anticode updates the app with no store release, and forms and CMS pages work as they do on the web. Capacitor's documentation describes loading a live address as intended for development, and many store apps do it anyway; the README says this and explains how to bundle a copy instead if you'd rather.
Limits
- You submit. Anticode doesn't contact Apple or Google, create accounts or hold credentials.
- No promise of approval. The native features improve the odds; they don't remove the risk of a minimum-functionality rejection.
- Tools you'll need. Xcode on a Mac for iOS, Android Studio for Android, Node to run
npm installandnpx cap syncbefore opening either project. - Not included: push notifications, a fully offline build of the site, and store screenshots, which need the app running in a simulator.
For the whole route from download to listing, follow the guide on taking a website to the app stores, and see the Capacitor integration for how the pieces fit.
Questions people ask
Does Anticode publish my app to the App Store or Google Play?
No. It gives you the project and the checklist. You sign, upload and submit with your own developer accounts.
Will the app update when I change my site?
Yes. It loads the live site, so a new publish in Anticode shows in the app without a store update.
Why does minimum functionality never pass?
Because only a reviewer can decide it. The checklist rates the risk from your site and lists what helps, but it won't pretend the risk is gone.
Do I need a published site first?
Yes. The checklist and the project are both made from a published site, and the app loads it.
Sources
- Capacitor configuration (server.url), checked