Is there a way to support in-app purchase workflow without submitting the actual app?

Question

I'm writing a test app, which needs to implement the in-app purchase feature. This app is only for testing so I don't want to submit it to the app store. However, according to the tutorials I found online, such as: http://www.raywenderlich.com/21081/introduction-to-in-app-purchases-in-ios-6-tutorial I'd have to submit the app through iTunes Connect. Otherwise all the requests needed with the ScoreKit framework will fail.

Is it really the case as of now (2015)? Can't I simulate the in-app purchase without a real submission?

UPDATE With the kind help from the only people that answered (@Msencenb), I have yet to be able to make this IAP work in a sandbox. I referred to this popular checklist: http://troybrant.net/blog/2010/01/invalid-product-ids/#comment-22

It says that I need to create a new developer provisioning profile for this new app with IAP... really? I thought the idea of the developer provisioning profile is to make it easy for a single developer to create multiple apps....

Also, it says "Have you submitted (and optionally rejected) your application binary?". Does this mean that I have to upload the binary to the MyApps under iTunes Connect or should I upload and further hit the "Submit for Review" button?

Answer 1

You will indeed need to create an app in iTunes Connect, and corresponding IAP products in order to get StoreKit working correctly (mainly because IAP and your app's bundle identifier are linked fairly intimately). Also note that the sandbox IAP environment needs to be run on an actual device, simulators do not have StoreKit purchasing powers.

That being said, you do not ever need to submit the app for review, nor will you need to actually submit the IAP products for review, as long as you are ok with staying in the sandbox.