Apple's 10% EU alternative-payment rate moves billing work onto app teams

For a qualifying sale, the cheaper route saves five percentage points of commission ^[16]. Apple's EU overview, as summarized in a guide published on dev.to, applies the 15% and 10% pair to participants in the Small Business, Mini Apps Partner and Video Partner programs, and to qualifying auto-renewable subscriptions after their first year ^[3]. An app selling mostly first-year subscriptions outside those programs pays Apple's other listed rates and has to compare from those. The guide says it is not tax or legal advice and tells teams to check the current terms before changing a live payment flow ^[15].

Under IAP, Apple processes the transaction and provides tax support and customer service ^[2]. Building the checkout screen is the cheap part. An in-app alternative processor hands those jobs back to the team: the processor's own fees, tax collection and remittance, subscription management, refunds, disputes, fraud review, support and reconciliation ^[9]. Apple's terms add requirements on entitlements, disclosures, reporting and child safety on top ^[8]. The guide does not put a figure on any of these costs.

Conversion is the input we'd expect a spreadsheet to get wrong. Set processor and operating costs to zero, and the 10% route matches IAP revenue only if it completes at least 94.4% as many checkouts, because 0.85 divided by 0.90 is 0.944 ^[17]. A relative drop of more than about 5.6% in completed purchases loses money before the processor takes its fee ^[17]. The guide warns teams not to assume web checkout converts equally just because it is available ^[11].

Linked offers are priced on a different basis. Apple describes their reductions separately from the 15/10 pair ^[4]. The seven-day attribution window also does not mean a web purchase outside it avoids every Apple fee, according to the guide ^[14].

The useful part of the guide is its model. It compares routes on the same customer cohort and accounting period. Eligible volume, conversion change, platform commission and processor and operating costs stay as separate inputs, priced from actual quotes and observed workload ^[10]. Separate inputs let a reviewer see which assumption moved the answer. On shortcuts, the guide is blunt: it tells teams not to use a generic Apple-versus-web percentage comparison as a forecast ^[12].

Eligibility has to be settled first. The Account Holder must accept the updated Apple Developer Program License Agreement. The team then verifies entitlements, storefronts, device requirements and account status for the app ^[7]. "The ability to build a flow is not proof that a specific app or developer qualifies for every option," the guide says ^[13].