“This bundle is invalid - The file extension must be .zip” error submitting to iTunes

Question

The last 24 hours, every time I submit my iOS app, I'm getting the error (after a successful upload/acceptance)

"This bundle is invalid - The file extension must be .zip"

and binary is flagged as invalid. I've successful submitted this many times through TestFlight, and a prior build just entered app review. My last successful submission was 2 days ago. I don't remember making any significant changes to my project, only changes to Xcode are that I turned on automatic updates in Xcode and downloaded all documentation.

I've cleaned project, deleted derived data, restarted Xcode, restarted Mac.

I am not using CocoaPods, which was the trigger for the problem in the only other question I've found with this error message. I am using Swift, and building an iOS keyboard extension, but again have had no problem uploading for months.

I'm not even sure where to start debugging this, the CocoaPods answer mentioned spaces in build names, but I haven't changed anything I can rememeber, and my app's name and no file in my project has a space in their names. Any suggestions for how to debug this?

Answer 1

I had the same error message from iTunes Connect. Based on a hint from @RhythmicFistman, I renamed a bundle resource file included in my app which I had naively named "somefilename.app" to use an extension of ".appres" instead. This is a totally custom file format of my own, and I guess the lesson learned is that Apple's rules effectively disallow including files with the .app extension when they are embedded inside your app.

Answer 2

This happened to me last week and I wrote about it.

I think it's related to the Apple Watch deployment, but basically if you're getting this message either you’ve got an incorrectly signed/malformed app or framework in your bundle, or it contains something that looks like one. It could even be a file name (not extension!) that ends in app, e.g. certificat.aveapp

To successfully submit in the latter case, you need to rename or remove the offending file.

Answer 3

Looks like it was an iTunes Connect Maintenance issue as dogsgod commented, just had submission accepted. This was weird because I waited overnight to see if it was just Connect issue. When my first submit this morning failed I wrote this up assuming after 16 hours it had to be my problem. But very glad still the same.