September 19, 2022
  • Announcements
  • Appflow

Appflow Build Stacks Updates

Matt Netkow

As the ecosystem of mobile operating systems continues to change, the software used to build and package your iOS and Android applications needs to keep pace as well. One of the great things about using a fully managed mobile CI/CD solution like Appflow is that we take care of all of this for you. The Appflow team follows these changes closely and works hard to give you the most up-to-date build stacks so that you can choose the infrastructure configuration that matches your needs when generating native app binaries in the Appflow cloud.

No matter the version of package manager, CLI, build tool, or operating system, there is a build stack suited to your particular project. The following is a look at the recent updates within Appflow.

New Build Stacks

In July, we released Linux 2022.07 for Web and Android binary builds, adding support for Android SDK 32 (Android 12) and Cordova CLI 11. If you use cordova-android 11 in your Cordova app, you must select this new build stack when building your Android app.

In September, we released macOS-2022.09 for iOS binary builds, adding support for macOS 12, Xcode 13.4, and Cordova CLI 11 (previously macOS 11, Xcode 13.1, and Cordova CLI 10). With the move to macOS 12, you may notice a decrease in iOS build times.

Look for a new build stack supporting Xcode 14 (and iOS 16) shortly after Apple releases iOS 16 this Fall.

Retired Build Stacks

Build stacks are typically retired approximately two years after their creation date. Given the pace of change in the modern web and mobile development ecosystems, the Appflow team recommends using the latest Build Stack for most apps and regularly updating your project’s dependencies.

Older Build Stacks are available for when your team needs a specific version of a build tool (i.e. an older version of Xcode or the Android build tools).

Recent retirements include macOS – 2020.08 and Linux – 2020.06. Mac and Linux versions of 2020.09 will be retired on or around September 30th, 2022. View all active Build Stack versions here.

Build, Build, Build!

With the recent release of two Build Stacks for iOS and Android, now’s a great time to check out Appflow, our continuous integration & delivery (CI/CD) platform for mobile development teams. Appflow helps development teams continuously build and ship their mobile apps faster than ever. Get started here.


Matt Netkow