App Store Fee Calculator

The App Store Small Business Program lowers Apple commission from 30 percent to 15 percent for developers who earned less than 1 million dollars in proceeds across all their apps in the previous calendar year. Almost every indie developer, early-stage startup, and new app qualifies, and you have to enroll rather than being opted in automatically. If your annual proceeds later cross 1 million dollars you move to the standard 30 percent for the remainder of that year, then requalify at 15 percent the following year if you drop back under the threshold. For most founders shipping their first app, enrolling in this program is the single highest-leverage move for your app economics.

Google Play charges a service fee of 30 percent on the first portion of revenue, but the first 1 million dollars you earn each year is charged at 15 percent under the Play developer program. Auto-renewing subscriptions are charged at 15 percent from day one rather than after a year. In practice this means a typical small or mid-size app pays an effective Google Play rate close to 15 percent, which is often lower than the equivalent Apple rate unless you are enrolled in Apple Small Business Program. The exact number depends on your annual volume and your mix of one-off purchases versus subscriptions, which this calculator models directly.

Two things stack on top of each other. First, the store commission of 15 to 30 percent comes off the top. Second, the price a customer pays usually includes local sales tax or VAT that the store collects and remits, so your revenue base is the pre-tax price, not the full amount charged. On top of that, foreign exchange and rounding on international sales shave a little more. The result is that a 9.99 app can net a developer closer to 6 to 7 dollars after commission, and less again once tax is separated out in some regions. Seeing the real net per sale, not the sticker price, is essential before you model runway or unit economics.

For digital goods consumed inside the app, both Apple and Google have historically required their in-app purchase systems, though regulatory changes such as the EU Digital Markets Act and various court rulings are opening limited external payment and link-out options in some regions, often with their own reduced commission rather than zero. For physical goods and real-world services, you are generally allowed to use your own payment processor and the store commission does not apply, which is why ride-hailing and ecommerce apps do not pay 30 percent. The safest approach is to model the standard commission, treat any fee reduction from external payments as upside, and confirm the current rules for your specific category and region before building your pricing around them.

It is a separate cost. Apple charges 99 dollars per year for an individual or organization Apple Developer Program membership, and that is required to publish on the App Store regardless of how much you sell. Google Play charges a one-time 25 dollar registration fee instead of an annual one. These membership costs are tiny compared to per-sale commission for any app doing real revenue, but they matter for a brand new app with little income, because you are paying to be listed before you earn anything. This calculator focuses on per-sale commission, which is where almost all of the money goes once you have paying users.

Many teams do exactly that, charging a higher price inside the app than on the web so the net after commission matches their target, and steering users to subscribe on the web where store rules allow. The trick is that raising your price to fully offset a 30 percent cut requires a gross-up, because the commission also applies to the extra you add, so you have to divide your target net by the retained share rather than simply adding 30 percent. This tool includes a price-to-net gross-up so you can enter the amount you want to keep and see exactly what to charge in the store to receive it.