MLB.com At Bat First App to Take Advantage of Custom Icons in iOS 10.3

Apple recently released iOS 10.3 for iPhones, iPads and the iPod touch and it comes with some new and useful features. One of the not-so-obvious new features of the software pertains to customizable app icons as seen on the MLB.com At Bat and NHL iOS apps.

The feature affords users of MLB.com at Bat and the official NHL app an opportunity to replace the apps’ respective icons with branded logos of their favorite teams, bringing a new level of personalization to the iOS home screen, reports TechCrunch.

“Already, the apps are focused on helping users get information about their favorite teams,” reads the report. “The apps today prompt users upon first launch to customize the experience to their needs by asking them to select which teams they want to follow in the app and through push notifications.”

Developers that want to offer personalized icons must create the necessary files in advance in order to include them on their apps, according to TechCrunch. Apple also recommends that the feature will only be included in apps that have theme customizations as its main feature.

Another setback with personalized icons is that it can only be changed by the user’s request. This means that developers aren’t allowed to change the app icons at will unless it’s part of a major software update.

Additionally, this also means that developers won’t be able to add support for dynamic app icons. For example, a weather app’s icon won’t change based on the current weather conditions.

“The company behind both apps, BAMTech, is often ahead when it comes to adoption of new iOS features,” reads the report. “For instance, MLB’s app last year was among the first to offer the new Split View feature on iPad.”

The app personalization feature is available to those who have upgraded to the new version of the apps, as well as the new release of iOS 10.3, which was released yesterday.