IFTTT now works with iOS push notifications and looks great on the iPad
If you're a user of popular personal productivity service IFTTT (If This Then That) who also has an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, maybe you've wished that you could use iOS push notifications in your recipes.
Context & Ripple Effects
IFTTT has been steadily converting its web-based recipe service into an Apple-native product since its iPhone debut in July 2013 brought Photos, Reminders and Contacts channels, and the move into the physical world via Belkin WeMo back in 2012 showed where the platform ambitions announced alongside its $7M Andreessen Horowitz-led Series A were pointing.
First-order effects
- iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users can now build recipes that alert them through iOS push notifications, closing the gap between an automated event happening and the user actually learning about it.
- The refreshed iPad app gives tablet owners a purpose-built interface rather than a scaled-up iPhone view.
Second-order effects
- Native iOS delivery makes Apple-device channels like Reminders, Contacts and Photos materially more useful, raising the value of the Apple-specific integrations IFTTT added with its 2013 iPhone launch.
- Competing automation services without equivalent mobile notification plumbing face pressure to match, since real-time alerts are quickly becoming table stakes for consumer recipes.
Third-order effects
- The episode underscores how dependent consumer automation platforms remain on host ecosystems' API and notification policies — IFTTT's 2012 removal of Twitter triggers under Twitter's new terms showed how abruptly a channel can be revoked, so deepening the Apple relationship trades one gatekeeper's rules for another's.
The trend: Consumer task-automation services are shifting from browser-based utilities to native mobile apps, with each platform integration both expanding reach and deepening dependence on the ecosystem owner.