A bug in Apple’s new health and fitness tracking software left app developers scrambling and threatened to overshadow the launch of the iPhone’s new operating system on Wednesday.

Apple said that it could take two weeks to fix the problem with the new Health app, which is a central feature of iOS 8 that has been pushed out to hundreds of millions of iPhone owners as a software update.

App makers were aiming to plug in to Apple’s HealthKit platform to allow users to send details of their workouts, dieting and other fitness metrics to the Health app, where they are displayed in a one-stop overview.

Many leading fitness-app developers, including Nike, MyFitnessPal and Jawbone, have been racing since June to update their apps to ensure HealthKit compatibility in time for the launch of iOS 8, which Apple has trailed as its “biggest release since the launch of the App Store” in 2008.

But within hours of iOS 8 becoming available on Wednesday, many of those developers found that their apps had been removed from the App Store due to the unspecified HealthKit bug.

“We discovered a bug that prevents us from making HealthKit apps available on iOS 8 today,” an Apple spokesperson said. The company said it was working to have the bug fixed in a software update and aimed to have HealthKit apps available by the end of the month.

MyFitnessPal, which tracks calorie intake for dieters, said it was working on a version of the app without the HealthKit integration to get back up on the store “as soon as possible.”

When it unveiled a range of new devices last week, Apple put their health and fitness features front and centre, as a key selling point. The new iPhone 6 includes new motion-tracking sensors, including a barometer to tell how many flights of stairs its owners have climbed in a day. The Apple Watch, which was shown off last week ahead of a launch early next year, will monitor the wearer’s heart rate and overall activity.

Apple is playing catch-up with rivals such as Samsung and Sony, who have already released fitness-tracking wearable devices, although analysts say the market remains at a nascent stage.

Teething problems for software updates are a familiar problem to any technology company, including Apple. In 2012, Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, was forced to apologise after the bungled launch of its Maps application, which replaced Google Maps as part of the iOS 6 update. The moment coincided with a high point in Apple’s share price to which it would not return for almost two years.

In a US TV interview with Charlie Rose last week, Mr Cook admitted that the company “screwed up” on the Maps release, with “many” reasons for the misstep.

“It should not have happened like it did. It should not have come out,” Mr Cook said. “Sometimes when you’re running fast, you slip and you fall.”

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