[dangus]

When you buy a new Apple device it comes with a trial for Apple subscription services. My iPhone 17 Pro came with a News+ trial.

If I didn’t cancel it it would charge me.

There was no way to turn off auto-renew without forfeiting the remaining trial period, which is a dark pattern to encourage accidental payments.

Mac devices also encourage things like documents in iCloud directly in settings which encourage migration to paid services.

By default, Apple apps like Music have notifications for subscriptions.

It’s not at the level of Windows 11 but it’s there when you’re really looking for it. Notifications in the system settings are not always critical update type of stuff, they are often semi-promotional.

[daishi55]

> If I didn’t cancel it it would charge me.

This is absolutely, completely false. Apple devices do not come subscribed to things that will charge you if you don’t cancel. Don’t be silly.

[dangus]

I explained poorly. What I mean is that if you accept the free trial, you’ll be billed if you forget to cancel.

That’s fine and normal, but what’s not as normal is that there’s no way to turn off auto-renew and keep your trial period. You either decide to cancel now and lose the rest of the trial or you’ve got to set a reminder to cancel.

The thing is, at different points Apple has offered free subscriptions between 3-12 months depending on their promotion. So it’s a pretty enticing trial depending on what’s being offered.