Apple informs developers of iTunes Connect shutdown December 21-27

iOS 7 (App Store teaser 002)

It’s that time of year again. The holidays are just a few weeks away, which means that cold weather, major Black Friday sales, and of course the annual iTunes Connect shutdown are all rapidly approaching.

In fact, Apple sent out an email to developers today, notifying them of the upcoming iTunes Connect closing. The tool, which devs use to submit and manage their apps, will be offline from December 21-27…

iMore has the email:

iTunes Connect will be temporarily unavailable from Saturday, December 21, to Friday, December 27, 2013. 

During that time, iTunes Connect will not be accessible and you will not be able to submit any apps or In-App Purchases. Processing of any Newsstand Atom feeds will be delayed until after December 27. Sales and Trends reports via the Auto ingestion tool will be available but may also be delayed. 

Also, you should not schedule any pricing changes or apps to go live between those dates. Pricing changes scheduled to take effect in that date range will cause the app to become unavailable for purchase until after December 27. Similarly, apps scheduled to go live during that range will not be released until after December 27. 

If you have any additional questions, use the Contact Us module on iTunes Connect.

Of course, this won’t affect users. But it’s worth noting that we typically see a rush of new apps and updates hit the App Store in the run-up to the shutdown as developers rush to to make the pre-holiday deadline.