Universal links open Safari instead of my app, the AASA file is on Vercel

Solved · 839 views · asked last month by sophie_l · edited

I want links like https://tidyhome.app/invite/abc123 to open my Expo app. Added associatedDomains: ["applinks:tidyhome.app"] in app.json, rebuilt, and put the file at public/.well-known/apple-app-site-association in my Next.js site.

Tapping the link in Notes or Messages always opens Safari. Android app links work fine.

When I curl the file I get it back, so it's there?

What I’ve tried

Reinstalled the app, rebuilt with EAS, waited a day in case of caching. Claude Code rewrote the AASA JSON three times.

Comment

Is the site on the apex domain or www? rafa_dev last month · edited

3 answers

Marked as helpful by the asker

ben_mobilelast month · edited

Check what curl actually returns, with headers:

curl -i https://tidyhome.app/.well-known/apple-app-site-association

Two things usually break it on Vercel:

Redirect. If tidyhome.app redirects to www.tidyhome.app (Vercel's default when you add both), Apple does not follow redirects. The file must be served with a 200 on the exact domain in associatedDomains.
Content-Type. A file without extension is served as application/octet-stream. Apple is lenient about this nowadays but serve application/json to be safe:

// vercel.json
{
  "headers": [{
    "source": "/.well-known/apple-app-site-association",
    "headers": [{ "key": "Content-Type", "value": "application/json" }]
  }]
}

Also: Apple fetches the file through its own CDN, not from the device, and caches it. After fixing, check with https://app-site-association.cdn-apple.com/a/v1/tidyhome.app to see what Apple has.

And the appID in the file is TEAMID.bundleid, not just the bundle id.

Comment

That's it. Either make the apex domain primary in Vercel or put www in associatedDomains. ben_mobile last month · edited

curl -i shows a 308 to www. That's it isn't it sophie_l last month · edited

Made apex primary, Apple CDN picked it up after a few hours, links open the app now sophie_l last month · edited

rafa_devlast month · edited

On the Vercel side: in Project → Domains, whichever domain has "Redirect to" set is the one that will 308. Set apex as primary and let www redirect, then it matches your app.json.

Comment

lukas_blast month · edited

For the Android side later: assetlinks.json has the same "no redirects" rule, and the SHA-256 fingerprint must be the Play App Signing key from the Play Console, not your upload key. That's the one that bites people once the app is live on the store.

Comment

Noted for when I do Android, thanks sophie_l last month · edited

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Universal links open Safari instead of my app, the AASA file is on Vercel

What I’ve tried

3 answers

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Universal links open Safari instead of my app, the AASA file is on Vercel

What I’ve tried

3 answers

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