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Kiosk and Home Screen

The Kiosk and Home Screen section of the Apple Policy Editor locks devices into one app, chooses which apps can be opened, arranges the Home Screen and adds website icons. Each setting is installed on the devices as a configuration profile.

Apple applies most of these settings only to supervised iPhone and iPad (devices enrolled with Automated Device Enrollment or prepared with Apple Configurator). Other devices don't get them. Web clips also work on unsupervised iPhone and iPad.

Choosing apps

Apps are identified by their bundle ID. Type the name of an app to pick it from the built-in Apple apps and the apps of the policy, or type any bundle ID, for example com.example.app.

Single App Mode

The device runs only the chosen app: users can't go back to the Home Screen or open other apps. Install the app with the policy first. The device leaves Single App Mode when you turn the setting off or remove the app.

  • Options: disable the touch screen, rotation, the volume buttons, the Ring/Silent switch, the side button or Auto-Lock, and turn on accessibility features such as VoiceOver or Zoom.
  • Accessibility features the user can turn on: features the user can turn on with a triple-click of the side button.

Allowed and blocked apps

  • Blocked apps: the devices hide these apps and don't open them. com.apple.webapp blocks all the web clips. Settings and, on iPhone, Phone can't be blocked.
  • Allow only some apps: the devices show only these apps. Leave the list empty to allow all apps. Policy apps adds the apps installed by the policy; com.apple.webapp allows all the web clips.
  • Apps that can start Single App Mode: apps that can lock the device into themselves while they need it, for example during an exam.

With Allow only some apps, every app that isn't in the list disappears from the devices, including the apps of the policy. Settings and, on iPhone, Phone always stay.

Home Screen layout

Arrange the Dock and the pages of the Home Screen. Add apps, folders of apps and the web clips of the policy, choosing where with Add to, and drag the icons to move them between the Dock and the pages. Click a folder to change its name and apps.

Users can't move the icons or remove apps from the Home Screen. Apps that aren't in the layout go to the pages after the ones you defined. An iPhone shows four icons in the Dock. Users can still delete apps that aren't Required in the storage screen of Settings. To stop that, turn off Allow app removal in App management.

Web clips

A web clip is an icon on the Home Screen that opens a website. Set the label and the URL, and optionally an image (PNG or JPEG, cropped to a square).

  • Users can remove it: turn off to keep the icon on the devices.
  • Full screen: the website opens as a web app, without the Safari address bar. Stay full screen on other websites also opens the links to other websites in the web app.
  • Open with this app: an app that opens the URL instead of Safari.

Notification settings

Choose how the devices show the notifications of some apps: whether they are allowed, where they appear (Lock Screen, Notification Center, CarPlay), badges, sounds, critical alerts, banner style, grouping and previews. Users can't change these settings.

Lock Screen message

A message shown at the bottom of the Lock Screen, for example who to call if the device is found, and an asset tag. Both can contain the variables $EMAIL$, $USERNAME$, $FULLNAME$, $SERIAL$ and $UDID$: a variable without a value for the device is left empty.