What are Apple App Store Auto-Renewable Subscriptions?

Great subscription apps justify the recurring payment by providing ongoing value and continually innovating the app experience. If you’re considering implementing the subscription model, plan to regularly update your app with feature enhancements or expanded content.

Many types of apps can take advantage of subscriptions, including apps that offer new game levels, episodic content, software as a service, or cloud support. Other appropriate subscriptions include apps that offer consistent, substantive updates, or access to libraries or collections of content. You can offer subscriptions (a type of in-app purchase) alongside other in-app purchase types.

Auto-Renewable Subscriptions can be configured to enable Family Sharing. This suggests that you could create a separate subscription group, or higher tier subscription within a subscription group, that is more expensive and which allows an Apple Family to benefit from your service or feature.

Subscriptions can be paired with Introductory Offers, Promotional Offers or Custom Offer Codes to acquire, retain, and win back subscribers.

Additionally, Introductory Offers and Custom Offer Codes can be combined to extend a customers trial period.

Follow our guide below to learn how to create Auto-Renewable Subscriptions.

In order to receive, measure and analyze or take action on events outside your app related to auto-renewable subscriptions; or to engage with customers when a payment fails, subscription expires or the customer buys, renews, upgrades, downgrades or changes an auto-renewable subscription status, you must create an App Store Server Notifications (ASSNs) system.

Read our business guide to get our latest market and customer research, perspective and recommendations on building Apple e-commerce apps that use In-App Purchases and Subscriptions.