A big advantage of Apple Family Sharing is that you can buy apps, music, movies, and books all at once and all family members can enjoy them. We show you how to download past purchases from family members.
Download apps through Apple Family Sharing
With Apple Family Sharing, you can exchange Apple digital purchases for free. That’s nice, because you don’t have to pull your wallet twice for the same app. The only exception to this are in-app purchases, such as an add-on for a game. You cannot share these with each other.
You can exchange all other purchased apps, both free and paid, within the family. Here’s how to download previous purchases from family members:
- Open the App Store on your iPhone or iPad;
- Tap your profile picture in the top right and choose ‘Purchased’;
- Tap on the name of the family member for which you want to view the purchased material;
- Then a window opens with all purchased apps, both free and paid apps;
- Find which app you want to download and tap the button next to the item to download it.
Do you not see any apps? Then Family Sharing is probably not set up properly. Check this by going to the Settings app on the family organizer’s iPhone. Then tap their name and choose Family Sharing. Then check in the window whether all the functions you want to share are actually all turned on.
Also read: How to set up parental controls on an iPhone or iPad: this is how you do it in 4 steps
Download purchases on the Mac
It works much the same on the Mac. First, open the ‘store’ from which you want to download apps, such as the App Store or Music app. In the case of the App Store, tap your profile picture at the bottom left, then choose the name of the family member whose apps you want to view from the menu to the right of ‘Purchases’. Then click on the download button.
Apple and the family
The iPhone, iPad and Mac play an increasingly important role in families, and there are consequences. On iPhone we therefore regularly pay attention to how you can use Apple devices so that it adds something to your family life. Also check the stories below.
- Apple Family Sharing: This is how you share apps and subscriptions with family members (4/22/2020)
- These are the 8 best free education apps for young children (3/17/2020)
- Monthly theme overview: we wrote this about Family in April (4/30/2018)
- This is what you need to know about the iPhone games your kids play (4/30/2018)
- Keep these 5 things in mind when choosing apps for your kids (4/19/2018)