Apple Now Offers Auto-Renewable Subscription Price Increase
Apple has now officially rolled out the feature to developers via an explanatory blog post. With this change, instead of manually opting in for a price change in a subscription plan, the plans will now be auto-renewed in case of a price increase. Apple says that this will prevent services from being unintentionally interrupted for users due to price changes in their subscription plans.
For platforms and services to be eligible for the new “auto-renewable subscription price increase” feature, developers need to follow certain guidelines set by the tech giant. For starters, developers can increase the prices of their subscription plans only once a year. This is to prevent scammy and fraud apps from increasing their subscription plans by a cent or two every now and then.
Furthermore, for monthly and weekly price increase situations, the developers cannot exceed the $5-mark or 50% of the previous price. So, if a monthly subscription plan costs $10 and the developer increases the price to $15 (price increase = $5, which is 50% of the previous price), that app will be eligible for the auto-renewable subscription price increase. However, if the price is increased to $16, users will have to manually opt in for the newly-priced plan.
Similarly, for annual subscription plans, the limit is set to 50% of the previous price or up to $50. Moreover, the price increase needs to be “permissible by local law” and adhere to other App Store rules. That said, if the price hike is more than 50%, users will still have to opt-in for the subscription plan.
To recall, earlier this year, Techcrunch reported that Apple was piloting a new feature for developers that allows them to automatically renew users’ subscription plans, even if there is a price increase in their current plans. At the time, the report cited developer Max Seelemann, who got an App Store notification for a price increase of a Disney+ plan. You can check out Seelemann’s tweet attached right below. iOS biz people… Subscription price increase as mere NOTICE instead of having to confirm, else subs expires.Is this new behavior for everyone or exclusive to Disney+? pic.twitter.com/zt7c15QcTA— Max Seelemann (@macguru17) March 24, 2022
For users, this change means that they will not have to manually go to their subscription settings to opt-in for a newly-priced subscription plan. Their auto-renewable subscriptions for supported apps will continue to automatically renew, even if there is a price increase. Apple will deliver “email, push notifications, and in-app messaging” to notify users about their auto-renewed plans.
However, given that this App Store change has various conditions, we are not sure if this is a welcome change for users. What do you think about the new App Store change? Let us know your thoughts on it in the comments below.
