Apple Wallet ad to promote a movie makes users angry

Apple Wallet users are angry after the app displayed an ad for "F1 The Movie". Et tu, Apple?

You may have heard about the movie, it is an Apple Original. Apple released the world's first haptic trailer for it a few weeks ago, it uses the Taptic Engine on iPhone to pulse and vibrate based on the on-screen action. I have to admit, it's a pretty cool trailer. If you have an iPhone, open the Apple TV app and watch the video. Here's a link to the trailer for your convenience. You don't need a subscription to watch the trailer.

Now, Apple is drawing flak from users who have criticized the company for promoting the movie aggressively. How, you ask? iPhone users got a notification with an offer for buying tickets to the movie. At first, I thought they got the ad when they opened the Wallet app, but no. It appears when you are using any app, that qualifies as an ad. The problem is it's delivered like a regular notification, i.e. it stays at the top of the screen for a few seconds, but also stays on the lock screen. A person reading about the issue got the same ad, that is funny!

I'm not a fan of ads either, but I have to point out such notifications are pretty common in many wallet apps. That's not a good thing, but when Apple does it too, it feels kind of cheap. You're supposed to be better, not join them!!! Notifications should not be used for ads, offers, they should be for communication, right? Nobody likes to be disturbed by a discount offer, especially on a phone that costs a cool $1000.

TechCrunch points out there is an option in iOS 26 that lets users disable "Offers and Promotions" from Apple Wallet, however this setting isn't available in iOS 18 or older, so you can't opt out of offers. More importantly, the presence of the setting confirms that Apple wants to push marketing messages through the Wallet app. That's no good, this needs to stop.

(Images via: reddit 1,2)

Did you get the ad? Did that make you angry?