Announcing Apache Cordova Retirement in App Center
Jihye Eom
Since App Center launched in 2017, we’ve added support for 16 platforms and frameworks. One of the first was Apache Cordova, a cross-platform framework that wraps JavaScript apps in a native container. Along with React Native, it was one of two frameworks to support CodePush and exactly what the community needed as many developers transitioned their skills from web to mobile apps. Since then, the needs of the community have changed just as Cordova’s popularity has waned. Today calls from the Cordova SDK account for less than 1% of App Center’s service.
Consequently, after a 6 month grace period, App Center will discontinue support for Apache Cordova. Support for all other platforms remains unchanged.
- Effective immediately, App Center will no longer offer the option to create Apache Cordova apps through the portal, CLI or API.
- Starting April 1, 2022, the App Center service will no longer accept calls from the Cordova SDK. While the services may continue to work for a short period of time afterward, we do not guarantee interaction of services or availability in the App Center portal.
If you have an Apache Cordova app and need assistance evaluating other options, our team is more than happy to assist you via our support channel. Simply open a support ticket under the drop-down menu on the right top corner of the portal.
As always, we appreciate every developer who builds, tests, distributes, and monitors their app with App Center. Today, we also want to extend a very special thanks to every developer who built an Apache Cordova app with us. We hope you had as much fun as we did. 🤖❤️📱
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31 comments
Cordova, we salute thee! For those looking for alternatives to App Center and CodePush, check out Ionic’s Appflow mobile CI/CD service, which handles the entire mobile app delivery process from building a native binary to publishing on the app stores and updating apps over time. You can build your Cordova-based iOS and Android apps in the cloud with our Native Builds feature, even sending them all the way to the app stores automatically. Our equivalent to CodePush is Live Updates, which let you ship live app updates, critical bug fixes, content changes, beta features, and more directly to user devices. Check our migration guide here.
With $499/month price tag, it’s not an option for most developers.
Hey Said, yep, we are in the same situation.. i’m trying to get a few people together to discuss an alternative / way forward https://github.com/IllusionVK/ReplaceAppCenter
Yep, we need really an alternative to ‘CodePush’ / Live updates at a fair and reasonable price.
I will be following your Repo closely.
Hello, I have an application written in ionic cordova, will it still work if I change buildsytsem to ionic native?
Hello, I would like to know if we can continue using Appcenter to distribute cordova apps? The construction is carried out outside the app center, but the distribution to internal users and to the stores is carried out by the appcenter.
I’m interested in this as well
We just use Appcenter for codepush, nothing else. Why can the distribution of codepush not still be allowed.
Hey Dylan, i’m wondering if a few of us can work on an alternative? if MSFT doesn’t have the time to do it then ok, but maybe a few people could pull together.. https://github.com/IllusionVK/ReplaceAppCenter
Hi! My team need to know it too. We have some Ionic Capacitor Apps created as Cordova apps in Appcenter and we need only the distribution functionality. Will the distribution continue to work for already created apps? Thanks
Hi, do you have any news about that? I have the same scenario too.
Hi! I wrote to Appcenter support and they confirmed that distribution will continue to work for already created Cordova Apps. Hope this helps
We are using it for our capacitor app, and capacitor is a growing platform. We use https://github.com/mapiacompany/capacitor-codepush, it will be really sad to not be able to use platform.
You could consider sentry-capacitor
Hey Berkay, I have mentioned that plugin here: https://github.com/IllusionVK/ReplaceAppCenter if we could get our own CodePush server working well, then we may have an OSS alternative
For teams looking for an alternative: Ionic’s Appflow service has full live update (remote code update) and native build support for Cordova and the modern Capacitor https://ionic.io/appflow
Does it also applied to Capacitor 2+ apps?
I have the same question
If anyone has an alternative please let us know 🙁
Check out VoltBuilder. It handles the build and upload of iOS and Android jobs. In addition, it features hosting, an API for automatic submission and uses the latest Cordova tooling. The pricing is also more reasonable.
Hey Mauricio, we are trying to discuss with people here about this: forward https://github.com/IllusionVK/ReplaceAppCenter
I’m shocked at how disrespectfully Microsoft acted in announcing the discontinuation of Cordova support.
Firstly, not giving notice in advance of closing new applications, and also because of the short deadline for shutdown.
Especially in relation to CodePush, it took it out of the community only to discontinue it.
This is NOT good news and overall my entire company is pretty shocked at this announcement. We depend on Codepush for our Cordova apps.
There is not a viable alternative now which is causing us lots of stress. Appflow, no matter what the Ionic team says, is NOT an alternative @ $499 per month.
I agree with this. The timing of Ionics mailer for AppFlow price increase to $499 is impeccable. I was considering migrating to AppCenter and CodePush from AppFlow when they announced the increase just for the soft update capabilities until I saw this post. Now I have no idea what I’m going to do…
Check out VoltBuilder. It handles the build and upload of iOS and Android jobs. In addition, it features hosting, an API for automatic submission and uses the latest Cordova tooling. The pricing is also more reasonable.
Also, check out VoltSigner, which is a free utility to create Android and iOS certificates securely on your local machine.
I’m on the dev team – feel free to send me questions!
It’s a pity the title of this article says that Apache Cordova is retiring. It isn’t. Microsoft support for it is, but there are alternatives.
Check out VoltBuilder. It handles the build and upload of iOS and Android jobs. In addition, it features hosting, an API for automatic submission and uses the latest Cordova tooling.
Also, check out VoltSigner, which is a free utility to create Android and iOS certificates securely on your local machine.
I’m on the dev team – feel free to send me questions!