Intro to mobile device management profiles
iOS, iPadOS, macOS, tvOS and watchOS 10, or later, and visionOS 1.1, or later, have a built-in framework that supports mobile device management (MDM). MDM lets you securely and wirelessly configure devices by sending profiles and commands to the device, whether they’re owned by the user or your organisation. MDM capabilities include updating software and device settings, monitoring compliance with organisational policies, and remotely wiping or locking devices. Users can enrol their own devices in MDM, and organisation-owned devices can be enrolled in MDM automatically using Apple School Manager or Apple Business Manager. If you’re using Apple Business Essentials, you can also use the device management that’s built in.
There are a few concepts to understand if you’re going to use MDM, so read the following sections to understand how MDM uses enrolment and configuration profiles, supervision, and payloads.
How devices enrol
Enrolment in MDM involves enrolling client certificate identities using protocols such as Automated Certificate Management Environment (ACME) or Simple Certificate Enrolment Protocol (SCEP). Devices use these protocols to create unique identity certificates for authenticating an organisation’s services.
Unless enrolment is automated, users decide whether to enrol in MDM, and they can disassociate their devices from MDM at any time. Therefore, you want to consider incentives for users to remain managed. For example, you can require MDM enrolment for Wi-Fi network access by using MDM to automatically provide the wireless credentials. When a user leaves MDM, their device attempts to notify the MDM solution that it can no longer be managed.
For devices your organisation owns, you can use Apple School Manager, Apple Business Manager or Apple Business Essentials to automatically enrol them in MDM and supervise them wirelessly during initial setup; this enrolment process is known as Automated Device Enrolment.
MDM and Stolen Device Protection
When Stolen Device Protection is turned on, if the user is in an unfamiliar location, the following actions are delayed by an hour:
Manually enrol their device in MDM
Manually install a passcode profile or configuration
Configure a Microsoft Exchange account in Settings or with a profile or configuration
Enrolment profiles
An enrolment profile is one of two main ways users can enrol a personal device into an MDM solution (the other way is to use User Enrolment). With this profile, which contains an MDM payload, the MDM solution sends commands and — if necessary — additional configuration profiles to the device. It can also query the device for information, such as its Activation Lock status, battery level and name.
When a user removes an enrolment profile, all configuration profiles, their settings and Managed Apps based on that enrolment profile are removed with it. There can be only one enrolment profile on a device at a time.
After the enrolment profile is approved, either by the device or the user, configuration profiles containing payloads are delivered to the device. You can then wirelessly distribute, manage and configure apps and books purchased through Apple School Manager, Apple Business Manager or Apple Business Essentials. Users can install apps or apps can be installed automatically, depending on the type of app it is, how it’s assigned and whether the device is supervised. For more information, see About Apple device supervision.
Configuration profiles
A configuration profile is an XML file (ending in .mobileconfig) consisting of payloads that load settings and authorisation information onto Apple devices. Configuration profiles automate the configuration of settings, accounts, restrictions and credentials. These files can be created by an MDM solution or Apple Configurator for Mac, or they can be created manually. For more information on using Apple Configurator for Mac to create and install configuration profiles on iPhone, iPad and Apple TV devices, see the Create and edit configuration profiles in the Apple Configurator for Mac User Guide.
Because configuration profiles can be encrypted and signed, you can restrict their use to a specific Apple device and — with the exception of usernames and passwords — prevent anyone from changing the settings. You can also mark a configuration profile as being locked to the device.
If your MDM solution supports it, you can distribute configuration profiles as a mail attachment, via a link on your own web page or through the MDM solution’s built-in user portal. When users open the mail attachment or download the configuration profile using a web browser, they’re prompted to begin configuration profile installation.
You can deliver a configuration profile that can change settings for an entire device or for a single user:
Device profiles can be sent to devices and device groups, and apply device settings to the entire device.
iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Apple Watch and Apple Vision Pro have no way to recognise more than one user, so configuration profiles created for iOS, iPadOS, tvOS and watchOS 10, or later, and visionOS 1.1, or later, are always device profiles. Although iPadOS profiles are device profiles, iPad devices configured for Shared iPad can support profiles based on the device or the user.
User profiles can be sent to users and (if the MDM solution supports them) user groups and apply user settings to just the respective users. Mac computers can have multiple users, so payloads and settings for macOS profiles can be based on either the device or the user. The user account created during Setup Assistant is considered managed by the MDM solution and can receive profiles. In macOS 11 or later, an administrator account created by an MDM during enrolment can be optionally managed instead. For Active Directory–bound deployments, the currently logged in network user becomes manageable using MDM.
Device and user settings vary according to where they reside: Settings installed at the system level reside in a device channel. Settings installed for a user reside in a user channel.
For more information about profile installation and Lockdown Mode, see the Apple Support article About Lockdown Mode.
Profile removal
How you remove profiles depends on how they were installed. The following sequence indicates how a profile can be removed:
1. All profiles can be removed by wiping the device of all data.
2. If the device was enrolled in MDM using Apple School Manager, Apple Business Manager or Apple Business Essentials, the administrator can choose whether the enrolment profile can be removed by the user or whether it can be removed only by the MDM server itself.
3. If the profile is installed by an MDM solution, it can be removed by that specific MDM solution or by the user unenrolling from MDM by removing the enrolment configuration profile.
4. If the profile is installed on a supervised device using Apple Configurator, that supervising instance of Apple Configurator can remove the profile.
5. If the profile is installed on a supervised device manually or using Apple Configurator and the profile has a removal password payload, the user must enter the removal password to remove the profile.
6. All other profiles can be removed by the user.
An account installed by a configuration profile can be removed by removing the profile. A Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync account, including one installed using a configuration profile, can be removed by Microsoft Exchange Server by issuing the account-only remote wipe command.
Important: If users know the device passcode, they can remove manually installed configuration profiles from iPhone and iPad that aren’t supervised, even if the option is set to “never”. Users on Mac can do the same thing only if the user knows an administrator’s username and password. They can do this using the profiles command-line tool, System Settings (in macOS 13 or later) or System Preferences (in macOS 12.0.1 or earlier). In macOS 10.15 or later, as with iOS and iPadOS, profiles installed with MDM must be removed with MDM, or they’re removed automatically upon unenrolment from MDM.
MDM communication requirements
Third-party MDM communication with Apple devices is most likely to be successful when:
The MDM solution is set up, successfully tested and working properly
The APNs certificate is valid and not expired
The device is powered on
The device is currently enrolled into the MDM
The network the device is connected to has access to the internet (for APNs communication)
The network the device is connected to must be able to access MDM-related Apple hosts
For more information, see the Apple Support article Use Apple products on enterprise networks.
Note: Apple doesn’t control third-party MDM solutions. Additional issues, such as a misconfigured MDM payload, may also cause MDM communication to fail.
Supported Apple devices
The following Apple devices have a built-in framework that supports MDM:
iPhone with iOS 4 or later
iPad with iOS 4.3 or later or iPadOS 13.1 or later
Mac computers with OS X 10.7 or later
Apple TV with tvOS 9 or later
Apple Watch with watchOS 10 or later
Apple Vision Pro with visionOS 1.1 or later
Note: Not all options are available in all MDM solutions. To learn which MDM options are available for your devices, consult your MDM vendor’s documentation.