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External payment links vs in-app purchase (US, 2025+)

RevenueCat's Dipsea test after the 2025 US ruling — web-only checkout earned $1.96/user vs $2.09 for IAP at a 30% fee (≈ a wash), fewer trials but higher trial conversion and far lower auto-renew-off (3.5% vs 19%); at the 15% fee IAP wins; Skylight saw +100% conversion moving a QR flow from web to Apple.

Updated 2026-10-24·2 sources·monetizationiapweb-checkoutapp-store-feesexperimentios

External payment links vs in-app purchase

TL;DR

  • Since a 2025 US court ruling, iOS apps in the US can link out to web checkout without Apple’s “scare sheet”.
  • RevenueCat’s 4-variant test on its own app Dipsea: proceeds per user $2.09 IAP-only vs $1.96 web-only (after 30% Apple fee and ~6% web costs) — about a 6% gap, roughly a wash.
  • At the 15% small-business fee, sending users to web is a clear loss.
  • Web: far fewer trial starts, but higher trial-to-paid; early renewal signal favours web (3.5% turned off auto-renew vs ~19% on App Store).
  • Given a choice with 30% off on web, most users still bought in-app: 68 web vs 132 IAP (75 annual + 57 monthly).
  • Recommended: a hybrid — some users to web, some IAP — if you pay 30%; stay IAP-only if you pay 15%.

Details

Setup (May 2025). David Barnard explains RevenueCat bought Dipsea to run public experiments. Variants: A = Dipsea’s existing React Native paywall; B = same paywall rebuilt in RevenueCat Paywalls (to rule out tooling bias); C = choice — blue IAP button for annual/monthly, red “try for free and save 30%” button to web; D = web-only, identical to B except the trial button opens web checkout.123

Results. Proceeds per user after fees: web-only (D) $1.96, IAP-only (A/B) $2.09; the IAP+web choice variant (C) slightly underperformed.4 Trial starts dropped sharply in D — consistent with the industry: even with Apple Pay, people start fewer trials on the web — but web trials converted at a much higher rate, partly closing the gap; B had the most paying users overall.5 Realised LTV so far: ~$10,000 for B vs ~$6,800 for D — almost exactly the 30% fee difference.6 In C, despite the 30% discount, only 68 users went to web vs 75 (annual) + 57 (monthly) in-app — perhaps preference for IAP or path of least resistance; adding a monthly option to the web path is a suggested next test.7

Renewal signal. Of annual subs eligible to renew in May 2026, only ~3.5% of web-billed users had turned off auto-renew vs almost 19% on App Store — so web LTV will likely end up higher; final numbers pending.89

Recommendation. If still in the Small Business Program (15%), keep everyone on IAP; if paying 30%, use a hybrid.10

Friction beats fees (Skylight). Skylight’s on-device QR code used to open a web checkout; switching it to Apple IAP lifted that flow’s conversion over 100%. Mark Ungerer says IAP “pays for itself” through reduced friction in their one good test; the fee only applies to a fraction of subscribers (most subscribe via their own website) and drops to 15% in year two.1112 Michael Segal’s framework: it’s growth vs profit — easy subscribing grows, avoiding the 30% “tax” juices profit; choose by ambition and profit profile. David adds web isn’t free money (more like 20% saved than 30%), and many customers prefer paying through Apple (cancellation is easy).1314

Disagreements / caveats

  • One app (Dipsea), US only, early cohort; wording on the web button wasn’t optimised (David invites better variants).
  • Platform rules are date-sensitive (US injunction in 2025); check current Apple guidelines and the status outside the US.
  • Web checkouts in web2app funnels (paid ads → web quiz → checkout) behave differently from in-app link-outs — see Why run web2app funnels (and when not to).

See also

Footnotes

  1. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 00:00 — David Barnard ↩

  2. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 00:49 — David Barnard ↩

  3. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 02:19 — David Barnard ↩

  4. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 03:29 — David Barnard ↩

  5. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 05:02 — David Barnard ↩

  6. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 08:07 — David Barnard ↩

  7. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 06:36 — David Barnard ↩

  8. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 09:41 — David Barnard ↩

  9. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 11:15 — David Barnard ↩

  10. External Payment Link vs In-App Purchase: RevenueCat’s $40k Experiment Explained @ 12:26 — David Barnard ↩

  11. How Skylight Doubled Subscription Prices to $79 – Michael Segal & Mark Ungerer @ 56:07 — Mark Ungerer ↩

  12. How Skylight Doubled Subscription Prices to $79 – Michael Segal & Mark Ungerer @ 46:27 — Mark Ungerer ↩

  13. How Skylight Doubled Subscription Prices to $79 – Michael Segal & Mark Ungerer @ 48:54 — Michael Segal ↩

  14. How Skylight Doubled Subscription Prices to $79 – Michael Segal & Mark Ungerer @ 48:09 — David Barnard ↩