[Superpost] In app purchases and subscriptions for IOS and Android

I would also like to see this option soon. I have no app users because, well, it’s brand new, but in-app purchases are weighing heavy on my mind as I near my version 1 release on the app store. At the start, I see the price I can charge as ok for my app. However, a lot depends on how popular it becomes. The more users, the more potential there is for me to have significant costs associated with the services my app is built around. Add to that the annual fees for Thunkable, licensing fees for data services, and minor other costs, and an in-app subscription for “pro” features is very lucrative to help offset all of those costs. Of course, an ad-supported option is there too, but I would really like to see the ability to set up an in-app subscription plan. Eager to see this feature added!

Just coming back to this topic with some updates from my end.

I launched my app on the App Store on March 22 and on the Play Store on March 29. Since then, I have pushed 316 units between both platforms with AdMob as my only source of monetization. I’m generating roughly $0.06/day. It’s not bad, but not great…yet. I could really benefit from having the ability to set up an IAP for a subscription ($4.99/year) to help maintain my app.

With the Thunkable PRO fees and other licensing fees I pay for services to run the app, it costs me about $125/month. Converting those 316 users into annual subscriptions would absolutely cover all of my annual fees. Is this something that is coming soon or is this something that, while I absolutely love this platform, I may need to look at other development options?

I ask, because this looks like a great benefit to several users and it has been discussed many times over for several months now with no real updates or movements. If this is something that is not really being actively developed, can you let us know?

I really love this platform because I don’t have to be programming proficient in two languages to develop a cross-platform app. The lure of being able to monetize and help offset my costs was the driving factor for my PRO subscription. However, if it’s not something I can further push to move away from ads in the near future, I’d like to know now so I can explore other options. People hate ads. I need a better solution.

Also, while it’s on my mind, is there any chance of Thunkable taking a cut of IAP proceeds when this is implemented? I don’t mind sharing a cut of my ad revenue, as I know you guys have extra work to do to ensure the quality of AdMob publishers with Google’s policies, but I feel like subscription payments should absolutely go 100% to the app creator. Just curious about that.

Can’t thank you all enough for having this platform! It’s been great and made it really easy for me to get a very useful app out to the masses in a very, VERY short amount of time (less than a month from concept to published).

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For the part of the in-app purchase maybe you could set up a website that will give the user a code once they have paid. Connect your website to the real-time database. The code would be sent to the database and have the key in the real-time database could be called “code” and the value could be the code from the website, then the user would enter the code on the app and the app would check to see if the code was valid by looking for “code” in the realtime database and if it is then you could call the local storage to save that it is a valid code.

I have not tried this but I hope that you find it useful :grinning:
Good luck

I would have to reread through the guidelines, but I think that would be a violation of Apple and Google’s terms of service with respect to in app purchases. Good idea though…

I completely forgot about those rules and the 30% cut.

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I have heard that it should be ready in the next month or 2. I am also eagerly waiting this feature

Thanks @ronnie - this is always nice to hear. For me the ability to ship a project to the Play Store and the App Store in 4 or 5 week instead of 4 or 5 months is a massive game changer, glad to hear you’ve also had a positive experience in this regard.


The goal is to have this out during this quarter, as you can see here I have access to a test version of this that Wei has built already. It’s not ready for prime time just yet, but we’re making great progress.

Don’t quote me on this, but I don’t think there’s a way for us to do this? My feeling is that it will probably be a PRO component (again, supposition on my part here, that may change in the future!)


Some back-of-the-envelope calculations:

Congrats on your first 300 users!

assuming a $2 cpm that’s like 10% DAU? That’s really good. The only issue, as you can probably tell is that if you 10x that to 100% (an no app in the world has 100% Daily Active Users) then you’re still only at $0.60/day. At that rate it will take you over 160 days to reach AdMob’s cash-out threshold of $100…so the immediate focus should be getting from 300 to 3,000 users. Have you posted about your app in #madewiththunkable?

Don’t forget that Apple and Google take 30% of you subscription fee so, if you’re paying out $1500 in subscription costs to run your app and you gross 316 x $4.99 ($1576.84) after the stores get their cut you nett $1103.78 so you end up losing about a dollar a day. The biggest assumption here is that 100% of you users convert to subscribers, which (unfortunately) never happens. I you got 10 subscribers out of your 300 users that would be a good conversion rate, anything between 30 and 60 would be excellent but as you can see that’s results in a significant shortfall. Again, if you focus on growing your userbase from 300 to 3,000 then it’s not unrealistic to think that you might get 200 or 300 subscribers from that.


Finally…

Thunkable is only $25 per months and the Apple developer account is $8.25 per month - where is the other $90 per month going? Perhaps as you expand you user base you could also start looking into ways to reduce your overheads? I’m not sure which membership you’re on, but swapping from monthly PRO to annual PRO will save you 16% ($50 per year) and if you can do that with your other costs you’ll be able to get closer to $1,000 per year in running costs which, just typing it out, seems like incredible value!

Anyway - I love getting into the weeds with this type of thing, let me know if there’s anything else I can do to help!

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Thank you Dom!

:point_up_2: THIS! :blush:


:+1:


And, I would definitely be willing to maintain my PRO subscription for that…


Thank you! It was a crazy five weeks of trying to get everything running smoothly, but it does! :smiley:


Not yet, but I certainly can/will. It’s a pretty specialized app (aurora chasing), so not sure how many of the masses here would be interested, but I can definitely share it!


Rough calculations on my end. Converting 300+ users to subscribers would certainly help more than the ad revenue…right now. I’m not looking to make millions, but the idea of having my user base substantially offset any costs associated with maintaining the app is really what I am after.



I pay $300/year for an astronomical API for sun/moon data, $25/month for weather data API access, roughly $30/month for a Google Cloud VM instance to run the web/data portion of the app, and some other smaller recurring costs. Nothing too substantial…more like another utility bill…but, it’d be nice to have more help covering all of those costs.


I will say, I have looked around. I tried a couple of other app development sites looking for any good alternatives. The rest are all “cookie cutter” development sites. Thunkable is, by far, the best I have found. As you have said, the HUGE plus is being able to develop one application and push it to BOTH Apple and Google. Again, you guys have made this SO EASY for me to accomplish. Very, very grateful this platform exists! :smiley:

Very appreciative of the inputs. I am excited to see what lies ahead!

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@domhnallohanlon Hello Domhnall, really appreciate the hard work of you and the team😊
Any updates regarding the in-app purchase component? Are you working on NFC components as well?
Looking forward to these two :star_struck:

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@abdallask IAP is getting close to completion, but we’re not working on NFC at the moment.

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yay!
Wooooohhhoooooo
I have to celebrate :partying_face: :partying_face: :partying_face:
:partying_face:
Also , What Is NFC

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Near Field Communication.

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Why are you not working on NFC? It is an important part, stops me from developing on ThunkableX…
I don’t need it for IOS, I just do Android…

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They are finishing one part before moveing to another

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For Android, you can use Web NFC via web viewer.

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Does that mean Apple Pay and Google Pay will be useable?
Having said that, when a user ‘swipes to pay’, is that NFC or just pre-stored card details? :confused:

Is this IAP just for digital content paid through Apple or Google, or will this be able to do payments for stuff like physical items that doesn’t have a fee via Apple or Google for in-app-content (i.e. ordering take-out then collecting it shouldn’t incur a fee as it’s not ‘in-app’).

Will it be via Stripe?

Thank you.

thunkable is built with react js

It’s been a few months, @domhnallohanlon. Any movement on this? I have some features I want to start working on, but I’m not going to put a lot of steam into them unless I can charge a subscription fee. I feel like I’m already providing my app users a huge service with the daily pennies I am collecting from AdMob.

Just curious. I am anxious to start generating some revenue to offset my 99.99998% out of pocket expenses.

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If anyone here is still interested, the latest updates on IAP seem to be being discussed on this forum:

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