How to open Mac App Store Programmatically

Mac App Store is accessed using macappstore URL scheme. Your URL should follow this pattern:

macappstore://itunes.apple.com/app/id[APP_ID]?mt=12

Replace [APP_ID] with your app’s track id.

How to find Track ID of any app

You can easily get track ID from URL of the application at App Store. For example, URL of Mac App Store page for Jump Desktop is

https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/jump-desktop-remote-desktop/id524141863?mt=12

Number between id and ? is the required ID which in this case is 524141863.

Lets test it. Replace [APP_ID] with 524141863 in the macappstore:// URL given above. Then open the URL from Terminal

open macappstore://itunes.apple.com/app/id524141863?mt=12

This should open Mac App Store desktop application to Jump Desktop page.

How to open Mac App Store from inside your Application

Now that we know the required URL scheme and track ID, opening iTunes page in Mac App Store is pretty simple. See the following code snippet.

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NSString *track_id = @"524141863";
NSString *app_url_str = [NSString stringWithFormat:
    @"macappstore://itunes.apple.com/app/id%@?mt=12",
    track_id];
// Create NSURL to pass it to NSWorkspace
NSURL *app_url = [NSURL URLWithString:app_url_str];
// Open URL
[[NSWorkspace sharedWorkspace] openURL:app_url];

You just need to the pass openURL: message with correctly formed URL to [NSWorkspace sharedWorkspace] object.

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