Stringers
Mobile App · iOS · written 11-6
C
Castora : IPTV Player & M3U8 · Ethan Parker

A Saudi IPTV player was pulled from Apple's App Store, and three months later someone put it back up under the same name. Easy to understand, not recommended to copy

What it is An IPTV player that presents itself as a "private media player", borrowing the name of a Saudi gray-market TV subscription brand, and earning money from weekly subscriptions.

Why it took off The brand's original iPhone player, June, was pulled from the App Store, so people who had bought codes could only search "Castora" on the App Store, and this app was what came up. Placed in the obscure Reference category, a few dozen ratings were enough to chart.

CHow you could follow Don't copy this one name. If you want to do it, look for brand gaps where the content is sold elsewhere and the iPhone player has just been pulled, and fill them quickly with ready-made templates. A safer path is to skip borrowing a name and build a general-purpose player around real selling points like in-car use or screen mirroring, the way CarTV does.

C grade: it surfaced because of a brand name that had just opened up, not because of the product; the whole storefront has only 40 ratings, and the same playbook is already being run at scale with rotating account names. If the original returns or Apple pulls this one too, the window closes immediately. The method for finding gaps is worth learning, but following it isn't worth the effort. Almost no one knows about it yet
Data (updated daily) · First launched 2026-09-10 · Italy rating 18 · Charting in 11-08 storefronts 16
iOS · best category chart rank · by store
5010015020010-2810-3111-0311-0511-0865 Italy163 Germany177 Spain
ItalyGermanySpain
Data 2026-10-28 → 2026-11-08 (12 days, 12 observations). Lower rank is higher; gaps mean it wasn't charted that day
iOS · Ratings · Italy
510152010-2810-3111-0311-0511-0818
Data 2026-10-28 → 2026-11-08 (12 days, 12 observations). Apple doesn't publish download counts; rating growth is a proxy for downloads.

Castora is a widely sold gray-market IPTV subscription brand in the Gulf. Its original iPhone player, Jun 27, was pulled by Apple. In Sep 10, a developer named Ethan Parker published an IPTV player also called "Castora", catching people who searched that name on the App Store, and used a niche category to get on charts in 12 countries. The playbook is clever, but the scale is small, people in the scene are already doing it in bulk, and it could be pulled at any time.

"Fill the fourth box with 903"

A Saudi online shop selling TV subscriptions, Uranus (urxus.co), has a very direct iPhone activation guide: step one, download Castora (the link points to the App Store id6760588570), or download NEXT+; then "fill the first box with your name, the second with the username the shop sent you, the third with the password, and write the number 903 in the fourth, then log in".

The problem is that both links in the guide are now dead. The original CASTORA (developer Sultan ALGhaithi) was pulled by Apple 2026-06-27 (per AppBrain's removal records); 11-06 can't be found on the App Store in Saudi Arabia, Italy, the US, or other storefronts, and neither can NEXT+. People who bought codes now have to search "Castora" on the App Store themselves. From Sep 10 on, that search returns Ethan Parker's version.

What Castora actually is

To be clear, "Castora" is not an app, it's a business. Saudi e-commerce shops sell "original Castora subscriptions": 8,700 channels including beIN SPORTS, SSC, MBC, and STC TV, plus over twenty thousand movies; 15 riyals a month, or 99 riyals for 15 months (osaka-store.com, castoraiptv.com, 11-06). It's a classic pirated sports-rebroadcast resale business, with codes sold by a swarm of small shops on Salla and Zid.

The user's path: buy a code at a shop, download a specified player from the app store, and log in with the account details. On Android, CASTORA on Google Play (com.codemaster.castora) is still up; listed Jun 3, 29,123 installs, and 1,335 more in the last 7 days (Google Play, 11-06). On iPhone, the original is gone, leaving an empty slot.

What this same-name App actually does

Its full name is "Castora : IPTV Player & M3U8", filed under the Reference category.

  • Name: it opens with Castora, so searching the brand name finds it; the back half piles on "IPTV Player" and "M3U8", so generic searches find it too.
  • Description: it never says "IPTV". It reads "the private home for everything you own", plays local files, LAN media and your own cameras, and lets you "add your personal streams and playlists", plus a "contains no content" disclaimer. That wording is there to pass review; "personal streams and playlists" is where you paste an M3U address or Xtream login.
  • Features: multi-view, Face ID lock, EPG matching, timeshift, AirPlay. Any generic IPTV player has these.
  • Pricing: Saudi store weekly subscription 12.99 riyals, monthly 24.99, lifetime 59.99 (App Store page, 11-06). A week of player costs more than a reseller's month of content.

Whether it can log into Castora's backend directly, i.e. whether the step where you enter the 903 from the 4th row works inside this App, was not verified. From the description, an account handed out by a reseller probably works (inferred).

How big the numbers are

Tiny. 11-06 In total, across all stores, there are 40 ratings, and 14 were added in the last 7 days (App Store). Broken down by country: Italy has 17 ratings averaging 4.6, and Saudi Arabia has 13 ratings averaging 3.5. Saudi's score is clearly lower, possibly because people looking for the original app found it wasn't the original (inference).

It never charted on any country's overall chart, only the Reference category chart. 11-06 positions: Norway Reference Top Grossing #48, Portugal Top Grossing #51, Saudi Top Free #55, Bahrain Top Free #61, Italy Top Free #65. In Saudi, from 10-28 to 11-06 it stayed between #29 and #55 on Top Free.

Don't let "Top Grossing" fool you. Reference is a tiny category: a handful of subscriptions can put you in its top 100, so these ranks say nothing about how much money it made. The countries where it charts are nearly all places where Castora subscriptions sell well: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, the UAE, Egypt. Italy is the exception, and its traffic likely comes from people searching "IPTV" (inferred; Italy's pirate IPTV market is already large).

Where users come from

  1. Brand-name search: the main channel. The original is delisted, reseller tutorials are still up, and users are still searching. On TikTok you can find Arabic-language topics like "how to get Castora on iPhone" and "Castora on iPhone not working".
  2. Niche categories: little competition, and a few dozen downloads can get you into the top 100 of a category's free chart, which brings some organic exposure.
  3. Cross-promotion within one family: a sibling App built on the same template, Next+ PRO (credited to Pooja Shah), rides the name of another delisted brand, NEXT+. The two Apps' privacy pages are nearly word-for-word identical, and they show up as "You Might Also Like" for each other on the App Store.
  4. Not seen: no media coverage; nobody on TikTok is promoting this App; searching "castora" on X returns almost nothing. Whether they run ads is unknown.

Who it's competing with

ProductScale (11-06)Compared with alternatives
CASTORA original (Sultan ALGhaithi)DelistedThe real brand. If it relists under its account, this App's traffic is gone.
Next+ PRO(Pooja Shah)220 ratings; #12 on Saudi Reference Top FreeSame template, same play, riding NEXT+
Tivimate - IPTV & M3U Player(Anna Mathew)Charted in 35 stores, 100 ratingsSame play, riding the Android brand player TiviMate
TvMate Pro(Grace Martin)Charted in 7 stores, 11 ratingsSame play
CarTV - M3U IPTV PlayerCharted in 100 stores, 23k ratings, +7 in the last 2,813 daysDoesn't ride a brand. Pitches in-car screen mirroring, sits in Utilities, and is hundreds of times bigger.
Smarters Player Lite, IPTVX, Perfect IPTV, etc.Each from 8k to millions of ratingsLegitimate general-purpose players under their own brands

(ratings from App Store)

"Ride the name of a freshly delisted grey-market IPTV brand, hide in Reference, and collect high-priced weekly subscriptions": this playbook isn't unique to this App. Judging by developer accounts that keep changing names, people are running it in batches, and the name-swapping is itself a hedge against bans.

If it were you

One-line verdict: understanding the route is enough; don't copy it. It surfaced by grabbing a name that just opened up, not on product merit, and that name can be taken back or removed by Apple at any time.

Who it fits: people already building iOS IPTV or media players who have ready-made templates and several developer accounts. For them it's just one more alias.

Who it doesn't fit: anyone trying to build a product that lasts; anyone with a single developer account who loses everything on a ban; anyone unwilling to touch trademarks and pirated content.

How to do it: if you really want to go after this kind of thing, watch for brands whose content is sold elsewhere while their iPhone player has been pulled. Two leads: iPhone activation tutorials on reseller storefronts (check whether the links still work), and delisting records on sites like AppBrain. Once you find a gap, use a ready-made template to publish under the same name and cold-start in a small category like Reference. The sturdier route is CarTV's: ride no brand, find a legitimate selling point (car, screen mirroring), put it in Utilities, and grow it.

How to acquire users: mainly brand-name search, plus keywords like "IPTV" and "M3U" in the App name. Reseller tutorials are the biggest traffic source. Getting written into a tutorial beats any ad spend, but it requires a relationship with the people selling the codes.

How early is early enough: the earlier the better. The gap is counted from the day the real brand was delisted, and it usually lasts only a few months: the real brand may return under a new account, competitors pile in, and Apple may remove the App after a trademark complaint. The Castora gap is already taken.

What would show this read is wrong: (1) this App's rating count climbs to several hundred or thousand a few months out and it keeps charting across the Gulf, which would mean brand-gap traffic is bigger and more durable than it looks and worth serious work; (2) it and Next+ PRO are still live six months on, suggesting Apple reviews this category more loosely than assumed; (3) conversely, if it's removed before year-end, or the original Castora returns to the App Store under its own account, the window for this kind of opportunity is shorter than a few months.

iOS store page ↗

Research notes: competitor table, acquisition evidence, full research report
Competitors
NameWhereLaunchedScaleHow it differs from this one
CASTORA original (Sultan ALGhaithi, id6760588570)iOS2026 first half, delisted 2026-06-27Scale before delisting unverified; the App named in reseller tutorialsThe real brand, now delisted; Castora (Ethan Parker) took over the same-name search traffic
CASTORA(com.codemaster.castora)Android2026-06-0329,123 installs, +7 in 1,335 days (Google Play library)The mainstream Android version, free; the iOS App just borrows the name
Next+ PRO: Watch Your MediaiOS2026-04-21220 ratings; #12 on Saudi Reference Top FreeSame template (identical privacy page text as EP APPS/PS APPS), riding another brand, NEXT+
CarTV - M3U IPTV PlayeriOS2026-08-16Charted in 100 stores, 23k ratings, +7 in 2,813 daysSells the in-car screen-mirroring angle, sits in Utilities, is hundreds of times bigger, and doesn't rely on any grey-market brand for traffic
Smarters Player LiteiOS2022-06About 1.71M ratings across all storesAn established general-purpose IPTV player under its own brand
Tivimate - IPTV & M3U Player(Anna Mathew)iOS2026-09-21Across 35 stores, 100 ratingsSame tactic, riding the Android brand TiviMate
IPTVX / Perfect IPTV / VU IPTV / Zen IPTViOS2014–2024Each 0.8–22K ratingsA legitimate general-purpose player that relies on no disguise or name-riding
Where users come from
  • Verified Brand search hijack (riding the delisted Castora original): the original id6760588570 was delisted on 2026-06-27 (AppBrain); the distributor urxus.co's iOS tutorial still points to that App; it was listed as Castora 2026-09-10, charting mainly in the sa/kw/bh/om/qa/ae/eg stores
  • Inferred IPTV reseller ecosystem (buy a code, then pick a player in the store): Osaka Store, castoraiptv.com, checkoutsa.store and others sell Castora subscriptions; a recall notice says Facebook resellers push "Next+ or Castora"; whether resellers name this App was not found
  • Verified keywords + charting in the small Reference category: the title stuffs in IPTV Player & M3U8, and with only 40 ratings it reached Reference charts in 12 countries; Italy's traffic is unrelated to the brand and is inferred to come from IPTV keyword searches
  • Verified same-template matrix cross-recommending: the Next+ PRO page's "You Might Also Like" lists Castora
  • Inferred TikTok / X / media: TikHub searches for castora and كاستورا returned no relevant videos; x-radar: 90 posts in 0 days

Castora : IPTV Player & M3U8 (iOS 6793563968) research report

In short: this is a repackaged IPTV player. It borrows the name of CASTORA, a grey-market IPTV subscription brand in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. That brand's original iOS player (id6760588570, developer Sultan ALGhaithi) was 2026-06-27 delisted by Apple. Ethan Parker put up this same-name App in Sep 10 and caught the reseller customers searching "Castora" on the App Store. It sits in the low-barrier Reference category, charted in Gulf countries and Italy, and earns from weekly subscriptions. The scale is small (40 ratings across all stores), and the playbook isn't unique: a whole batch of Apps using the same template and the same "ride the brand name and hide in Reference" approach already exists.

1. How to read the data card (correcting first)

  • Scale: total ratings across all stores 40, +7 in the last 14 days (appstore.app_profile, 2026-11-06). By country: Italy 16 (iTunes lookup shows 17, average 4.59), Saudi Arabia 12 (lookup 13, average 3.46), Portugal 4, UAE 3, US 5 (average 3.8). Saudi has the lowest score, possibly because people searching for "Castora" downloaded it and found it isn't the original (inferred).
  • Ranking: only charted in the Reference category chart, never on the overall chart. 11-06 Best spots: Norway Reference Top Grossing #48, Portugal Top Grossing #51, Saudi Arabia Top Free #55, Bahrain Top Free #61, Italy Top Free #65. Saudi Arabia 10-28 to 11-06 stayed around Top Free #29–55; Italy hovered at #51–73; Oman 10-30 and 10-31 charted on Top Grossing at #60/#68; Switzerland, Spain, Ireland and Germany each charted sporadically on Top Grossing at #108–178 (appstore.app_day). Reference is a small category, so the bar to chart is low; a few subscriptions can get you onto Top Grossing, so these ranks don't mean much revenue.
  • Pricing: In the Saudi in-app purchase store, it's Weekly SAR 12.99, Monthly SAR 24.99, Lifetime SAR 59.99 (App Store page, read via r.jina.ai, 2026-11-06). The recall card lists weekly $2.99 / monthly $5.99 / lifetime $12.99.
  • Rating count drops back: The card shows 10-28 as 24,10-29 and 22; 11-01 is 38, and after that 37, 36. The aggregation by store changes the basis, so it isn't necessarily Apple clearing ratings. Not verified.
  • Bundle ID exposed: The bundle_id is com.ethan.signalbox (appstore.app table), which doesn't match the current name. This suggests it was originally submitted under a different name or positioning and later changed to Castora (inferred; the database has no name history for 10-28 before this).
  • Recent reviews: The Apple review RSS returns no reviews for sa/it/pt/ae/kw, and none were collected in the database either.

2. What exactly is "Castora"? This is the key to understanding it

  • CASTORA is an IPTV subscription brand sold in the Gulf: The Saudi e-commerce store Osaka Store sells "original Castora subscriptions". The 12-month plan includes 8,700 channels, including beIN SPORTS, SSC, MBC, STC TV, Channel 8, plus 21.8k movies and 11.6k series. Monthly is SAR 15, and 6 months is SAR 49 (osaka-store.com/en/ZqddmBZ, /en/ABEEKWG). The castoraiptv.com title reads "اشتراك Castora الرسمي في السعودية" (official Castora subscription in Saudi Arabia), 15 months for SAR 99, 3 months for SAR 35. Many small Salla/Zid shops like checkoutsa.store and iptvcastora.com also sell it. This is a classic grey-market IPTV resale business (pirated sports broadcasts).
  • The user path: buy a code from a reseller, then download the "Castora" player from the app store and log in with the account. The iOS activation tutorial on the reseller Uranus shop (urxus.co/pages/activate-ios) says: ① download Castora (apps.apple.com/sa/app/castora/id6760588570), or ② download NEXT+ (id6443335504), then "enter the name in the first box and the username the shop sent you in the second".
  • The original iOS app is gone: The AppBrain page says CASTORA (id6760588570, developer Sultan ALGhaithi) "was removed from the App Store Jun 27, 2026" (search snippet). Our iTunes lookup can't find it in us/gb/pt/it/fr/de/sa/br, and it isn't in the appstore database. The other NEXT+ in the tutorial (6443335504) also can't be found in sa/us.
  • The Android version is still up: On Google Play, CASTORA (com.codemaster.castora, developer CodeMaster_2026) is listed at 2026-06-03, with 29,123 installs, and +1,335 over the last 7 days (googleplay.app_profile, 2026-11-06). There are also other same-named apps such as com.shot.castora and com.live.tv.iptv.player.xtream ("Castora: Live TV IPTV Player") (appbrain / apkpure search results).
  • There is also castora.tv, which describes itself as a software platform for TV operators to make white-label apps and manage subscribers. It says it sells no content and supports only Android. Its relationship to this subscription brand is unverified.

Takeaway: On iOS, a gap has opened where the brand has demand but the original app has been pulled. When a reseller's existing customers or new code buyers search "Castora" in the App Store, the result they find is Ethan Parker's app. Whether it can directly log in to Castora's panel (whether Xtream accounts work) is unverified. The description says you can "Add your personal live sources and lists", meaning you can enter M3U/Xtream accounts, so an account from a reseller probably works.

3. Competitors

CompetitorsPlatformLaunchedScaleHow it differs from Castora (Ethan Parker)
CASTORA original (Sultan ALGhaithi, id6760588570)iOSFirst half of 2026; removed in 2026-06-27Scale before removal unverified; the reseller tutorial recommends it firstThe brand's official app, designated by resellers; no longer listed. The Ethan Parker version is capturing its search traffic
CASTORA(CodeMaster_2026)Android2026-06-0329,123 installs, +7 in 1,335 days (Google Play library)The mainstream Android version, free; the iOS version only borrows the name
Next+ PRO: Watch Your Media(Pooja Shah,6761815482)iOS2026-04-21220 ratings across all stores; Saudi Reference free #12 (11-06)Same template: identical privacy page, "EP APPS" swapped to "PS APPS", same description "IPTV Player — Private Media Workspace". It piggybacks on another reseller brand, NEXT+ (the original 6443335504 also can't be found). The two appear in each other's "You Might Also Like" on the App Store
CarTV - M3U IPTV Player(Lyntra Technology,6800211040)iOS2026-08-16Charted in 100 stores, 23k ratings, +2,813 over 7 daysPositioned around car and screen-casting, placed in Utilities, with hundreds of times its scale
Smarters Player Lite(WHMCS Smarters)iOS2022-0666 stores, about 1.71M ratings combinedA veteran general-purpose IPTV player. Velko's article says IPTV Smarters Pro was removed from the App Store early in 2026
Tivimate - IPTV & M3U Player(Anna Mathew,6809753935)iOS2026-09-21Across 35 stores, 100 ratingsSame tactic: borrows the name of the Android favorite TiviMate, placed in Reference
TvMate Pro - Smarter Iptv(Grace Martin)iOS2026-06-30Across 7 stores, 11 ratingsSame name-borrowing (TiviMate / Smarters), placed in Reference
IPTVX, Perfect IPTV, VU IPTV, Zen IPTV, Fuevana IPTV Pro, and othersiOS2014–2024Each 0.8–22K ratingsA legitimate general-purpose player that doesn't rely on any grey-market brand to drive traffic
Castle Movies / MerlMovie / Lok L0ck / Cinejoy, etc.iOS2026Castle Movies: 38k ratings, 38 storesMovie apps in the same Reference category disguised as browsers/reference tools, showing Reference is a common hiding place for this kind of app

Scale data sources: appstore.app_profile and googleplay.app_profile, 2026-11-06.

4. Where users came from (growth tactics)

  1. Brand search interception (main channel, strong evidence): After the original 2026-06-27 was removed, it launched 09-10 and used "Castora" directly as the name's opening. Reseller tutorials and TikTok topic pages ("تنزيل تطبيق Castora على الايفون", downloading the Castora app to iPhone; "مشكلة تطبيق Castora للايفون", problems with Castora on iPhone) show people are looking for an iPhone version. The countries where it charts are almost all Gulf (sa, kw, bh, om, qa, ae) plus Egypt, which is exactly where Castora subscriptions sell the most.
  2. Reseller ecosystem: The recall card mentions IPTV resellers on Facebook directly promoting "Next+ or Castora". Osaka Store sells Castora and NEXT+ as two parallel subscription brands (osaka-store.com/en/vAgzBVZ). Whether these shops have written the Ethan Parker version into their tutorials, no evidence was found, unverified.
  3. Keywords + subcategory: The name stacks "IPTV Player & M3U8" and goes into Reference. This category has little competition, so a few dozen downloads can get it into the top 100 of the category free chart, and charting brings some organic exposure. The Italian traffic (free #51–73, 16 ratings) has nothing to do with the Castora brand; it likely comes from searches for "IPTV" (the Italian pirated IPTV market, "pezzotto", is large. This is an inference).
  4. App Store recommendations: The "You Might Also Like" section on the Next+ PRO page lists Castora (apps.apple.com/kw/app/6761815482?see-all=customers-also-bought-apps). Apps built on the same template can send a little traffic to each other.
  5. Channels not found: On TikTok, searching "castora", "كاستورا", and "castora iptv" turned up no content promoting this app. In the local X corpus (x-radar, 90 days), "castora" appears 0 times. Ad libraries show nothing either (this app isn't on the tracked list, so not finding it doesn't mean it isn't advertised).

5. Why it surfaced (it has only "poked its head up")

  • Timing: The brand's official app was removed by Apple in June, leaving a demand gap on iOS. It filled the gap in September with the same name, so anyone searching "Castora" can find it.
  • Category choice: Reference has a low bar. 40 ratings can get it onto the charts of 12 countries at once (data card, 11-06).
  • Compliance packaging: The description contains not a single IPTV function word. It says "private home for everything you own", local files, DLNA, network cameras, "personal live sources", plus a disclaimer, to get through review. Only the title carries IPTV/M3U8, for search.
  • Monetization: Weekly subscription at SAR 12.99, which is more expensive than the resellers' SAR 15 monthly subscription. Users have already paid for content, and they need a working player on their phone, so they're willing to pay again for the player. This also explains why it appears on the Reference top-grossing charts in Norway, Portugal, and Oman with only 40 ratings.

6. Differentiation

The product itself has essentially no differentiation. The multi-view canvas (Scene), Face ID lock, smart EPG matching, time-shift pause, and AirPlay described in the listing are all standard in general IPTV players, and it uses the same template as Next+ PRO. The real difference is the name: it occupies a just-vacated grey IPTV brand name with lots of paying users in the Gulf. That is why it surfaced, not because the product is good. This advantage is also fragile: if the original re-lists under a new disguise, or Apple removes this one under trademark or IPTV review, the traffic is gone.

7. How many people have seen it

  • No media coverage, 0 posts on X, and no one promoting the app on TikTok. Revenue isn't public and nobody has shared numbers.
  • But the playbook of "piggyback on a grey IPTV brand name + hide in Reference + weekly subscription" is already crowded: the same account network has Next+ PRO (Pooja Shah), and there are similar Tivimate clones and TvMate Pro, and several same-named "Castora" apps on Android. It's happening in a small circle, but nobody discusses it publicly.

8. What others can learn

  • Watch for brand gaps where "the content is sold elsewhere and the player was pulled": resellers' activation tutorials list the designated apps, and removal trackers (AppBrain's removed records) tell you which brand has opened up on iOS.
  • Cold-start in a small subcategory (Reference): the bar to chart is low, and charts in small Gulf countries are easier to enter.
  • High-priced weekly subscriptions: users who have already paid for content will also buy a player at a high price.
  • The risks need to be stated plainly: this path depends entirely on the piracy ecosystem and review loopholes, with very high trademark, copyright, and removal risk. The account network (developers who rename, like Ethan Parker or Pooja Shah) is itself a hedge against account bans.

9. Uncertain

  • Whether Ethan Parker has any cooperation with Castora's operator or resellers, i.e. whether it's an "officially authorized stand-in", is unverified. Whether it can directly log in to Castora's panel is also unverified.
  • Real revenue: The bar for Reference top-grossing charts is too low to estimate an amount.
  • com.ethan.signalbox was previously called something else, and when it became Castora is unverified.
  • Whether the rating count drop 24→22 is due to Apple cleaning up or a change in collection basis, unverified.

Sources

This article was written by AI from public data and the data we collect daily. Numbers are sourced, and inferences are labeled.