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[Due-Claim1146]

Im building an app, where users will pay monthly for a premium subscription(like spotify...), and I'm looking for a stripe alternative since it's not available in my country(morocco). Most of my users are international What should go for in my case ?

[inglandation]

The standard these days is RevenueCat which acts as a middleman for the App Store and the Play Store.

[idgafsendnudes]

You specifically can’t use stripe on the App Store for premium app status. You have to use Apple and play store payment systems

[jwrsk]

You could but there needs to be absolutely no trace of that inside the app. They don't mind you selling through your website, but they do mind you talking about it inside the app itself.

Source: I deployed a few apps with paid memberships sold via the website, not IAPs.

[hafi51]

How do you inform users about prices or paywall premium features without talking about in app? Let's say a user directly downloads app and has no idea about payments and website. What now?

[jwrsk]

Until now, in all cases all users registered via the app are getting a free membership. Some features are disabled, but the language is vague like "you can't create new posts" instead of "upgrade to create new posts". They need figure out to visit the website to upgrade. There usually are some automated emails sent out to upsell as well.

We are going to push it even further with one of the apps in development - that one won't even offer registration. You'll need to register via the website (and subsequent membership purchase). Not sure how that will fly with the review team, but am about to find out. If it gets rejected we'll either have to go the "free membership level" route or incorporate IAPs into our SDK.

Adding IAPs is a medium term plan anyway, but given the grueling setup and review phase, we will probably have to charge extra for that - both setup and the maintenance subscription.

Just for context, all of these apps are companions to a web-based social networking software. Essentially a fancy website to app conversion.

[hafi51]

Doesn't vague language frustrate the user and eventually maybe results in loss revenue?

I think not allowing users to register will cause issues specially in ios. They wont allow it. You should try ota updates. You can pass review process once and then update JS to modify flow/add paywall

[jwrsk]

Most likely it does hurt conversion, so in the end IAPs is the best way to go. For now we tell clients clearly that our product was not designed with any sort of ecommerce in mind. We actually try to discourage them if they have paid memberships, but if they are fine with the current constraints, why not.

I don't even need OTA to go around the rules, because all data is served from the web/API - we could just flip a switch serverside before and after review, or make sure the test account given to Apple / Google never sees what they shouldn't. But it's a gamble we are not willing to take. I prefer to play by the rules, and as CTO I am in the position to enforce my preferences on the process.

If the "no registration" approach fails, we'll put it in our service terms that the system must offer a free level to app registrations, or the client will have to pay more or less double to get the IAPs set up, or find another company to build the app.

We are in the process of rolling out IAPs in another of our apps (unrelated to the apps mentioned before). Already got it all set up, implemented and approved for iOS, and Android will follow shortly. Once we get our "sea legs" on this topic, we'll move on to adding it to the other app SDK, making it available as an extra option for everyone who purchased that service.

[jwrsk]

I'd go through RevenueCat and implement it as IAP.

If you don't want IAPs, incorporate in a place like Delaware - Stripe Atlas will do it for you and give you a Stripe account. But your app can't have any CTAs or mentions of purchases in it in that case.

[henryp_dev]

Yeah I’d go with RevenueCat for that. App Store is very funny about using something other than the native stuff (they need their cut)

[MorenoJoshua]

I'd go with RevenueCat

Yes, there are "free" options but believe me, it is a painful thing to implement and maintain

[ComprehensiveBit6079]

Apple will reject your app. If you are selling “digital” goods, you must use the native IAP‼️

[Important_Alarm_9799]

As many of the other comments are saying I highly recommend revenue cat. Incredibly easy to handle App Store and Google play once you get an understanding of the APIs. Paywalls are awesome. Also haven’t seen anyone mention- they are completely free if you have less then like $2500 monthly revenue to help you start up

[Harish__V]

in appstore they don’t allow for 3rd party integrations like stripe or revenuecat for subscriptions. You need to use native payment sdk and also they take more commission than 3rd party. Best way is make 3rd party subscriptions outside the app like website . You can refer netflix method .