2.5 weeks in 'Waiting for Review' for a metadata-only change - is this normal now?

Hi everyone,

I'm posting here because I honestly don't know where else to get answers anymore.

I've been trying to release my first app for about 2–3 months now, and the review process has been, frankly, a disaster for us. As a first-time publisher I've genuinely tried to do everything by the book — I've read the guidelines carefully, prepared reviewer notes, a demo account, sign-in instructions, everything that's recommended.

But here's the pattern I keep running into:

  1. Every submission sits in "Waiting for Review" for around two weeks — currently even longer. I know the official expectation is that most apps are reviewed much faster, but that has never once been our experience.
  2. When the review finally happens, it stops at the first issue found. Instead of reviewing the whole app once and giving me a complete list of everything that needs fixing, I get exactly one rejection point, I fix it, resubmit — and then wait another two weeks just to learn about the next issue. If I got all findings in one pass, I could address everything in a single build. This one-issue-per-cycle loop is what turns a fixable week of work into months.
  3. Right now I've been waiting 2.5 weeks for a metadata-only change (updated store screenshots). No binary change at all.
  4. I've contacted App Review support to ask for a status update and have received no response.

For context: the same app has been live on Google Play for several weeks and is doing well there. We're not trying to sneak anything past review — we want to comply. We just need to actually be told what to fix, ideally all at once, and to not lose two-plus weeks per iteration.

So my questions:

  • Is there any way to get a complete list of issues in one review pass instead of one rejection per cycle?
  • Is a 2+ week "Waiting for Review" time normal right now, or is there something about our account/app that could be causing this?
  • Is there any effective way to get a status update when support doesn't reply? (Expedited review requests haven't helped either.)

I understand App Review has to handle enormous volume, and I'm not looking to bash anyone — but as a small developer, this process has been demoralizing. Any advice from people who've been through this, or any pointers from Apple folks who read here, would be hugely appreciated.

Thanks.

I’ve been an Apple developer since ios5 and I’ve released many apps over the years. Most took less than a week even in the old days. My current new app has now been stuck for 3 weeks and communication from the reviewer and from the developer support has been either non-existant or robotic. There’s something very wrong at the moment. I’m wondering if all the reviewers have been pulled off to test problems with ios27 or siri AI? It’s very frustrating and very disappointing.

Same issue here….

the second Problem is, im waiting now for weeks for Review, in this time other Apps get 5 Reviews/Updates in One Week.

UPDATE

The Status changed to "In Review" 24h later. Normally It took around 1 hour to review but now its stuck for 4 days now....

Good Luck! Im still waiting since 12 September…!

App ID: 6747684577

2.5 weeks in 'Waiting for Review' for a metadata-only change - is this normal now?
 
 
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