Recently, there’s been lots of focus on the fees Google and Apple take from developers for purchases through the respective Play Store and App Store. Now, SlashGear reports that Google will be cutting this commission by half starting next year.
Google Play Store commission for subsriptions won’t be 30%, but 15%
Starting January next year, the commission Google takes from subscriptions in apps via the Google Play Store will go from 30% to 15%. This change affects specifically digital subscriptions in apps, which is, according to the company’s blog post, one of the fastest-growing models for payments in apps. Until now, Google had an offer that the fee will drop from 30% to 15% after 12 months of a recurring subscription, but now things will change and the fee will be 15% from the beginning of the subscription.
Additionally, music streaming services and ebooks will be eligible for a service fee as low as 10%. This change is a part of Google’s Media Experience program, which earlier this year made it so these services can have a fee of 15%.
The long-going battle for lower commission rates
Talking about these commissions started back last year with game maker Epic and Apple’s legal battle, which happened again for the reason of high commission rates. For those of you who don’t know, Epic Games’ popular mobile game Fortnite was pulled from Apple’s App Store last year when the scandal was going on. What happened back then was that Epic Games tried to bypass the App Store’s 30% commission by including a link for alternative payments in the game Fortnite, which was breaching the contract the developer had with Apple. Subsequently, Apple removed the game from the App Store and since then, Epic Games has been fighting against Cupertino and Google in court.
