Apple Business • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple Business

#351

Post by andyferris » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 5:48 AM UTC

georgeburdell wrote: post #2

One of the last great consumer companies is going B2B

I think what they've announced is the best fit for small businesses, not large enterprises. They can still treat it as a B2C-style service - many tiny customers with similar needs. Mom and Pop can now get a domain name through Apple, with email accounts - for a lot of people that might be the only way they'd know how to do something like that.

The business needs here aren't so different to family manangement features, say.

Throwing in Entra ID / Google Workspace authentication and multiple Apple IDs per device is probably the most "interesting" part as to where that ends up in the distant future.

Re: Apple Business

#352

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 5:50 AM UTC

meego wrote: post #77

I recently tried setting Apple Business Manager for our ≈20 people SME. The first step was "Domain Lock/Capture" which takes over all Apple accounts for a specific domain. I've never had a worse experience from Apple. The process is buggy, filled with foot-guns and dead ends. It expects huge amounts of work from users who have had their account for more than a few weeks and are expected to remove a lot of their perso…

[deleted]

Re: Apple Business

#353

Post by neuroelectron » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 5:50 AM UTC

meego wrote: post #77

I recently tried setting Apple Business Manager for our ≈20 people SME. The first step was "Domain Lock/Capture" which takes over all Apple accounts for a specific domain. I've never had a worse experience from Apple. The process is buggy, filled with foot-guns and dead ends. It expects huge amounts of work from users who have had their account for more than a few weeks and are expected to remove a lot of their perso…

>The process is also impossible to cancel.

This sort of thing should probably be illegal.

Re: Apple Business

#354

Post by andyferris » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 5:54 AM UTC

joshstrange wrote: post #223

It’s not clear to me if the MDM is included for free as well or if that will continue to be charged separately (or on top). I looked into their MDM, but ended up going with Mosyle instead because the costs were significantly lower for me.

I believe it said it will be free, starting April 14.

Re: Apple Business

#355

Post by andyferris » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 5:55 AM UTC

anizan wrote: post #264

Apple should compete with Google workplace or at the very least at least offer custom domain e-mail inboxes.

Custom domains (BYO or buy through Apple) and email hosting is in the announcement, too.

Re: Apple Business

#356

Post by lynx97 » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 5:58 AM UTC

ndespres wrote: post #212

IrishTechie wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can be done that way, but it is definitely not the norm. Businesses will generally “purchase” (many for €0) apps in ABM that are to be used for business purposes and push those to devices, the user can then use an Apple ID to download any other apps they want for personal use.

If they’re using Managed Apple IDs they will have no access at all to the app store and won’t be able to download their own apps anymore. IT department will have to buy and assign any apps that anyone needs, even the $0 ones that only 1 person needs.

If my employer did that to me, I would seriously consider sueing them.

Re: Apple Business

#357

Post by eastbound » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 6:02 AM UTC

weslleyskah wrote: post #323

legitster wrote: post #254

This announcement is pretty sad. If you're wondering why Apple is an IT department nightmare, this announcement is more of a confession. Today your corporate MacBook can have ... preinstalled software! And user groups (for the Apple store and iCloud). Wait, there's more! > In addition, customers can now set up business email, calendar, and directory services with their own domain name for seamless and elevated commun…

Why people bother with all of this to lock the environment into some kind of corporate nightmare? Why not allow some freedom for the worker. I don't see the appeal, it feels like a claustrophobic cage

SOC2 requires to ensure all computers have the software updates installed. While certification apps can check every desktop with a monitor, ABM could just do it and enforce it.

SOC2 also encourages SSO.

Re: Apple Business

#358

Post by pixeldash928 » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 6:04 AM UTC

martibravo wrote: post #31

martibravo wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of new businesses are going the Notion/Google Drive route for docs, tables and knowledge, plus Canva for presentations and more visual work. It's not the majority, but the market is there.

Plus Pages, Numbers and Keynote are free on Macs, minus the new paid features. I think it's a no brainer for new businesses

Unfortunately, there's a reason people prefer paid office software over Apple's free suite. Apps like Numbers are chaotic in the face of Excel.

Re: Apple Business

#359

Post by loeber » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 6:13 AM UTC

I previously tried buying Apple for Business and it was an endless runaround with terrible signup nterfaces and having to call dumb flunkies. The whole process sucked and was disrespectful to their business customers, who do not have the time to deal with such nonsense.

Re: Apple Business

#360

Post by moondance » Wed, Mar 25, 2026, 6:22 AM UTC

AlotOfReading wrote: post #24

I occasionally trial complete switches to Apple services to see if they're viable as Google alternatives. This weekend was Apple maps and it's finally met my standard of "usable", though not quite "good". One of the places it beat Google maps was the lack of integrated advertising places, which have enshittified the latter. I'm glad Apple announced their own plans to enshittify before I got my hopes up.

Live gas prices on GMaps is the only feature yet to make it over to Apple Maps, as far as I can tell. Once Apple integrates that one, my phone will finally be free of Google services.