Apple gets 30% off your app purchase and/or in-app purchases, while it gets 30% from your subscription for the first year and 15% for the subsequent years.
So, if you think your app is worth 10$, you lose 3$ and the ability to make more money and to support its development (if you do, they have to be in-app purchases, like extensions, etc. and again 30% is gone).
On the other hand, if you sell it with a 0.83$/month subscription (= 10$ / 12months, just to be "fair"), the first year you lose 3$ but you gain later 1.5$. And btw, I don't even think 0.83$ is allowed (AFAIK the price points start with 0.10$ so you can't have weird numbers like 0.23$ or things like that), so you round it up to 0.89$/month or 0.99$/month and you gain even more money, which will be used also to keep the development going.
Wanted to add that Apple's fee is pre-tax, and Apple doesn't pay taxes (duh).
Additionally, the refund policy of Apple is so bad that they keep the 30% and the developer has to pay for refunds 100%, meaning it's a net loss and a lot of indie game devs got doxxed into insolvency because of this.
> Additionally, the refund policy of Apple is so bad that they keep the 30% and the developer has to pay for refunds 100%, meaning it's a net loss and a lot of indie game devs got doxxed into insolvency because of this.
Money.
Apple gets 30% off your app purchase and/or in-app purchases, while it gets 30% from your subscription for the first year and 15% for the subsequent years.
So, if you think your app is worth 10$, you lose 3$ and the ability to make more money and to support its development (if you do, they have to be in-app purchases, like extensions, etc. and again 30% is gone).
On the other hand, if you sell it with a 0.83$/month subscription (= 10$ / 12months, just to be "fair"), the first year you lose 3$ but you gain later 1.5$. And btw, I don't even think 0.83$ is allowed (AFAIK the price points start with 0.10$ so you can't have weird numbers like 0.23$ or things like that), so you round it up to 0.89$/month or 0.99$/month and you gain even more money, which will be used also to keep the development going.