Apple updates TestFlight with support for beta testing of Apple Watch apps

TestFlight AppleWatch support

As part of a flurry of updates related to Apple Watch ahead of tomorrow’s first batch of shipments, Apple on Thursday updated its TestFlight application with ability to install and beta test apps on your Apple Watch.

With today’s update, iOS developers no longer must exclude the WatchKit binaries when uploading iPhone and iPad apps with WatchKit functionality to iTunes.

Last October, Apple extended TestFlight to everyone, allowing developers to invite up to a thousand users to beta test their iOS apps using a simple email invitation and a user’s Apple ID credentials.

I’ve been using TestFlight since its inception, way before Apple bought them, to test upcoming new apps kindly shared with me by iPhone and iPad developers.

With today’s update, I’ll be able to actually test forthcoming Watch apps on my wrist before they’re released for public consumption on the Apple Watch App Store, which went live earlier today with about 3,000 apps for the Watch.

Apple snapped up Burstly, the company behind TestFlight, in February 2014 to help its registered developers distribute iPhone and iPad apps to beta testers before pushing them to the App Store for release.

TestFlight is available free of charge and requires iOS 8.0 or later.