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App Center Guidelines

The App Center is a central place on Facebook for people to find great social apps. It’s designed to show off high quality apps and great user experiences.

We know that you spend a lot of time developing your app, so we’ve created this document to help you understand the review process and what we expect to be listed in the App Center.

Before you submit your app, be sure you’ve read and complied with the guidelines below and our policy guidelines. Not all apps will appear in the App Center, and we reserve the right to remove apps that do not meet a high quality bar. Once you’ve created your app detail page, we’ll review it and your app to make sure it meets our eligibility, submission, and quality guidelines.

We’re excited to see your app succeed, and look forward to promoting it in the App Center.

Eligibility

These apps are eligible for the App Center:

These apps are not currently eligible for App Center:

  • A Page Tab app
  • A Desktop web game off of Facebook.com

App Detail Page

Once you create an app detail page, your app will show up in search results and be eligible to be listed in the App Center. Follow these guidelines when creating your page:

  • Display Name - Use the exact name of your app. Don’t add any additional keywords to the name of your app. For example, if your app is named “Billiards”, don’t submit your name as “Billiards – Pool”. You may include the platform name (e.g. [App Name] for Android) if the app is only available on a single platform (e.g. Android).

  • Tagline - Your tagline should not include your Display Name, rather it should include some promotional copy about your app.

  • Short & Detailed Descriptions - Describe how your app works and what makes it unique. Be accurate, so people aren’t surprised when they start using it. Use standard spelling, grammar and capitalization. Don't include URLs, excessive punctuation, price information, keyword lists or non-standard symbols.

  • Category & Subcategory - Select a category that most people would expect. See the category descriptions for more information.

  • Review your app settings - App detail pages are dynamic based on what integrations you’ve specified on the basic settings page of the App Dashboard. Be sure to review this and remove any old or non-functional integrations. For example, if you’re building an iOS app you shouldn’t have anything in the Site URL, Mobile Web URL or Canvas URL fields.

Image Guidelines

When creating your icons, banners and cover image make sure to follow these guidelines:

  • Icons - Upload attractive, relevant, original icons. Icons should be simple and free of visual clutter (ex: buttons or additional info). Different-sized icons should be similar, with no distortion and pixilation.

  • Cover Image - Choose an image that conveys what your app is all about. Use simple imagery that people will easily recognize, with limited text, shadows, and distracting patterns. Don't use arrows or other references to the buttons below your cover image to encourage people to install your app. When designing the Cover image, keep in mind that the 128x128 px icon slightly obscures the lower left corner of the Cover image, as displayed below.

  • Small and Large Banners - Drive people to your app detail page with visually compelling images that clearly show the name of your app. Don't include buttons, URLs, excess text, promotions, or price information. Please ensure your image fills out the frame completely (e.g. no white space, no rounded edges, no borders).

  • Screenshots - Show off unique and engaging parts of your app, and demonstrate how the app is social. Don't use images that are unrelated, misleading, or dramatically different from what most users experience. Screenshot should not contain marketing copy, bulleted lists of features or calls to action e.g. "Click here to play the game!". Websites with Facebook Login must include at least one screenshot indicating a personalized user experience.

  • Images (general) - Your images should match the quality of your app. They shouldn’t have buttons, excessive text, borders, dropshadows, URLs, promotions, pricing, or third-party logos. Promotional banners must include the name of your app and cannot have a white background, rounded edges or borders. Icons may have white or transparent background (we recommend transparency and PNG, not GIF). Screenshots should be screenshots of the actual experience (no additional graphics overlaid, no distorted angles).

App Quality

The App Center is designed to showcase high-quality apps that people love to use. To be listed in the App Center, your app should:

  • Have an easy-to-use interface, clear content, value to users, and no significant bugs.
  • Show a clear distinction between ads and content, without excessive advertising.
  • Have high app ratings and a low negative feedback rate.
  • Set clear expectations about what user activity it shares on Facebook, and when.
  • Not mimic Facebook UI elements in a way that's misleading or unintuitive.
  • For websites: When people click through from the App Center, they are logging into your website. All websites and mobile web apps need to immediately present these users with a logged-in experience. Specifically, we’re looking for personalization, such as your name and profile picture, and that these logged-in users are not presented with “Login with Facebook” buttons. Learn more about how to check user status and provide a personalized user experience.

The Review Process

After you submit your app detail page, once it has enough positive ratings and engagement we will review it for App Center listing.

If your app detail page is rejected for any reason, our team will provide a brief explanation as well as suggestions for your resubmission. After you make the necessary changes, you can resubmit for re-review.

Even if your app is rejected for App Center listing, users will still be able to find it through search, bookmarks, and various social channels such as feed and timeline.

Please keep in mind that creating an app detail page doesn’t guarantee that you will be listed in App Center, and we reserve the right to remove any apps that don’t meet our quality standard.

Common Submission Mistakes:

Before you submit your application for App Center review, please be sure to read through this checklist of common mistakes. This will prevent unnecessary back-and-forth communication and delays.

  1. Mobile apps built for iOS and Android must use Facebook Login.
  2. Websites with Facebook Login must provide personalization on landing.
  3. All banners must include your app name.
  4. Banners cannot have white backgrounds (e.g. whitespace at edges/borders).
  5. Images cannot have excessive text. It's OK for text to enhance context for screenshots, but do not include text that does not relate to the actual screenshot.
  6. Images cannot contain third party advertisements (e.g. Android Store or Apple Store logos) or promotional text (e.g. “Voted #1 in App Store!”). Please restrict this to your description.
  7. Screenshots must depict real game play, no concept art or marketing materials.
  8. App descriptions cannot contain grammatical, capitalization, or punctuation errors. Please read over carefully before submitting.

Thank you

We hope these guidelines help you develop apps that users enjoy. We'll update this document from time to time.

Most of us have been Facebook developers ourselves at one point in the past, so we are excited to promote and distribute great apps, and to help you succeed.

Thanks again for developing with Facebook.

Next step: Create your app detail page

Updated about a month ago
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